The Muscatine County Attorney is urging Iowa’s attorney general to ask the nation’s highest court to review today’s Iowa Supreme Court’s ruling on an immigration-related case.
Muscatine County Attorney Alan Ostergren filed the identity theft and forgery charges against Martha Martinez for using a fake ID to get a job. He said the state supreme court’s dismissal of the case creates “unusual protections” for undocumented immigrants.
“The fact that a person has a separate legal problem, in effect they’re here illegally, gives them an immunity from prosecution that a US citizen would not have,” Ostergren told Radio Iowa. “That’s a very unusual situation to have in the law.”
While Ostergren initially filed the charges, it’s the state’s attorney general who represents the State of Iowa in federal court if an Iowa Supreme Court ruling is appealed.
“I certainly hope that the attorney general’s office would strongly consider filing that petition. I think that would be appropriate,” Ostergren said. “What we have is a state court decision interpreting federal law, which finds State of Iowa statutes to be unconstitutional in their application in this case, that they’re preempted by federal immigration laws.”
A spokesman for Iowa Attorney General Miller was not immediately available for comment.