I went through the truck today, and removed my passport and birth certificate from the console box and stashed it in my rig. I carried those along with vehicle registration and insurance card in the event I get stopped in Arizona, Alabama, or a few other states with ferocious undocumented immigrant laws. No problem here in Washington, or the several states I will be visiting in the next several months.
I got the impression from Joe Arpaio in Maricopa County Arizona that his staff would be inspecting immigration status of everyone stopped, with no regard whatsoever to color or language. He said that over and over. The very best I can do is my passport and birth certificate, but even that made me nervous as I know it’s not enough for proof positive. At least on the street for a routine pull-over, I’d still have some trouble proving I wasn’t an undocumented Irishman. Or, since I wear Texas plates, a Texan.
Imagine my relief when I heard that a US court has said that Arpaio was only questioning the status of brown people that spoke another language, like Spanish. I’ve never been able to grasp a second language, completely out to lunch when someone speaks Spanish (“Dos Tacos!”), and am useless in speaking Irish.
Arpaio finally admitted he was targeting brown-skinned people able to speak Spanish, and promised to quit doing it. So I figure Irishmen are off the hook.