Last month, Arizona’s governor signed a draconian anti-immigrant law that has come under fire from civil rights and civil liberties groups, sports teams, the president, and even the occasional outspokenly anti-immigrant politician.
People For has now joined a number of other national groups in signing on to a travel boycott of Arizona until the law is reversed. The groups—including the National Council of La Raza, the American Civil Liberties Union, SEIU, the Leadership Council on Civil Rights, and the Center for Community Change—have agreed to:
- Not hold any conventions, conferences, special events, or major meetings involving significant travel to Arizona from out of state, while this law is in force.
- Strongly discourage their affiliates, chapters, or members from holding any conventions, conferences, special events, or major meetings involving significant travel to Arizona from out of state, while this law is in force.
- Widely disseminate the adverse consequences of this legislation to their key stakeholders, for the purpose of encouraging informed judgments regarding whether stakeholders should hold, convene, sponsor, or otherwise support any conventions, conferences, special events, or major meetings involving significant travel to Arizona from out of state, while this law is in force.
- Call on all other major American institutions to consider choosing alternative locations for conventions, conferences, special events, or major meetings already scheduled involving significant travel to Arizona from out of state, while this law is in force.
- Call on their affiliates, chapters, members, stakeholders, all major American institutions, and people of conscience everywhere to carefully consider whether the dollars they spend as consumers of goods and services could end up, directly or indirectly, supporting the perpetuation of this unjust law.
Arizona is already hurting from this and other boycotts. Less than three weeks after the new law was passed, Arizona’s hotel and lodging association had already counted a loss of 23 meetings, at an estimated loss to the state of $6 to $10 million. And a city official in Phoenix has predicted that boycotts could cost his area $90 million over the next five years.
Read questions and answers about the boycott here.