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Statement on President Trump's Pardon of Joe Arpaio

August 25, 2017 (New York, NY) – Hispanic Federation has issued the following statement in response to President Trump’s decision to pardon Joe Arpaio.

“President Trump’s decision to pardon Joe Arpaio, the disgraced former Maricopa County Arizona sheriff, is an affront to our system of laws and an insult to the thousands of Latino Arizonans who were unfairly and illegally targeted by Arpaio’s policies.

“In July of this year, Arpaio was convicted of criminal contempt of court after failing to obey a 2011 order from a federal judge that he stop detaining people in his jurisdiction whom he suspected, with no evidence other than their appearance, were undocumented immigrants. In a sweeping and grotesque exercise in racial profiling, Arpaio created an atmosphere of terror and intimidation for thousands of Latino families in the Southwest. After a federal judge ordered him to stop his crusade against Latinos, he continued without pause, defying a federal order and, in the words of Judge Susan Bolton, “announc[ing] to the world and to his subordinates that he was going to continue business as usual no matter who said otherwise.”

“This blatant disregard for the law, coupled with Arpaio's failure to show remorse, should have been enough reason to deny him pardon. What’s more, the absence of guidance from the Department of Justice, which typically provides the President with important analysis of potential pardon cases, casts an ugly pall over President Trump’s decision today.

“In the absence of legitimate reasons for pardoning Arpaio, it’s clear to us that President Trump’s pardon today reflects his endorsement of the former sheriff’s campaign of racial profiling and criminalizing immigrants. This is disgraceful but unsurprising. In less than eight months, President Trump has launched a campaign of racial and ethnic divisiveness that has no equal in the last half century of American political life.

"We call on Americans of good faith and a sense of social justice to join Hispanic Federation and its network of member agencies, in emphatically condemning today’s cowardly and unmerited pardon."