INDIANAPOLIS — Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita this month sent out civil demands to six organizations, including nonprofits and a school district, as part of an investigation into “coordinated efforts” to bring large numbers of migrants to Indiana.

But the move could be laced with legal landmines and end up in court, according to immigration lawyers.

Rokita sent the demands to organizations in Logansport, Evansville and Seymour — communities that have all recently gained media attention for rumors and falsehoods circulated about their immigrant communities.

In Logansport, the Cass County Health Department and Logansport Community School Corp. received demands. In Evansville, notices were sent to the nonprofit God is Good and Berry Global Group. Jackson County Industrial Development Corp. in Seymour received a demand, along with the international nonprofit group Tent Partnership for Refugees.

Civil demands are not public record and it’s unknown what Rokita specifically requested from each entity.

Rokita said his office is conducting the investigations under Indiana’s Deceptive Consumer Sales Act and indecent nuisance statutes, claiming the influx of illegal immigrants is causing “unneeded stress” on schools, hospitals, law enforcement and labor and housing markets.

“I’m creatively trying to use every tool in the law to stop the Left’s intentional destruction of Indiana,” he said in a release.

‘IT SMACKS OF INTIMIDATION’

The move mirrors recent actions taken by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who in September sent a civil investigative demand to the El Paso nonprofit Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center, which provides legal services to immigrants.

The demand, like Rokita’s filings, also claims the group is violating the state’s Deceptive Trade Practices Act.

The nonprofit is now suing Paxton, a Republican who over the years has filed a litany of legal actions against local migrant nonprofits and immigration rules implemented by President Joe Biden’s administration.

The Las Americas lawsuit claims Paxton’s investigation is just a plot to shut down the nonprofit by violating its constitutional rights to free speech and attorney-client privilege.

The nonprofits targeted by Rokita could have grounds to take similar action, explained Jenifer Brown, an Indianapolis business immigration lawyer. Unlike businesses, nonprofits and religious organizations are not obligated to vet clients’ immigration status, according to Brown.

“I am confused and bewildered and sad to think about the targeting of these organizations,” she said. “Frankly, it smacks of intimidation and fear mongering.”

The demand sent to the Cass County Health Department in Logansport could also potentially run afoul of HIPAA laws, which protect health information from disclosure without a patient’s consent, Brown explained.

Gurinder Kaur, CEO of the Immigrant Welcome Center in Indianapolis, said the filings seem to aim at creating “fear and angst” more than actually investigating illegal immigration.

“It just continues to put immigrants in a negative light and feed into what’s happened in Seymour and Logansport,” where rumors about migrants have led to threats and pushback from residents, Kaur explained.

A GROWING PRECEDENT

Rokita’s actions are likely the first time an Indiana attorney general has levied investigative demands against government agencies and nonprofits as part of a civil investigation, noted Brown.

But it’s not the first time state lawmakers have targeted migrants. In 2016, under former Gov. Mike Pence, lawmakers issued a report detailing what they saw as the negative economic impacts illegal aliens had on the state.

Legislators last year also passed a law restricting immigrants without full U.S. citizenship from receiving a driving card. A federal judge in January temporarily suspended those restrictions for residents receiving federal humanitarian protections after the Indiana American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit.

Rokita’s investigation marks a new, more invasive approach to curbing surging immigrant populations. It’s one a growing number of Republican state attorney generals are using following the searing rhetoric promoted by President-elect Donald Trump during his campaign.

Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost in September directed his office to research legal avenues to stop the “federal government from sending an unlimited number of migrants to Ohio communities.” Yost specifically targeted Springfield, where Trump falsely claimed Haitian immigrants were eating pets.

Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey also turned a routine request for a company to verify the lawful status of its employees into a ramped-up political attack. The letter sent to the masonry business argued that the Biden administration intentionally refuses to enforce federal immigration law.

“The chaos unleashed at our open southern border wreaked havoc on our communities, and now individual states … must stand in the gap as the federal government refuses to act,” states the letter sent to the company.

Rokita has also used his investigation as a political attack, saying in a release that “illegal immigration caused by ‘border czar’ Kamala Harris’ perversion and misapplication of federal law has made every state a border state.”

Brown, the immigration attorney, said that obvious political overtones in Rokita’s investigation makes her question his motives, which appear to be more about creating fear in cities with large foreign-born populations than stopping illegal immigration.

“I’m nervous for our communities around the state,” she said. “I thought maybe after the election we could just take a deep breath and regroup and figure out kind of what’s next. And here we are.”

The new law was passed last year and aims to “protect consumers from suppliers who commit deceptive and unconscionable sales acts” and to “encourage the development of fair consumer sales practices.”

It says a manufacturer, wholesaler, or retailer may “not commit an unfair, abusive, or deceptive act, omission, or practice in connection with a consumer transaction,” including soliciting a transaction by using a “telephone facsimile machine to transmit an unsolicited advertisement.”

A “consumer transaction” is defined as “a sale, lease, assignment, award by chance, or other disposition of an item of personal property, real property, a service, or an intangible … to a person for purposes that are primarily personal, familial, charitable, agricultural, or household, or a solicitation to supply any of these things.”

The Massaro Legal Group described the act as “a fairly complicated statute clothed in relative obscurity.” It’s complexity comes from the way it is written, its scope, and the numerous cross-references to other conduct and statutes that fall within its purview.

Source: The Massaro Legal Group