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ObjectiveThe passage of Arizona SB 1070 in 2010 focused national attention on punitive, state‐level immigration legislation. Largely ignored is the increasing number of beneficial, state‐level policies passed duringthe sameperiod. We seek to understand whether beneficial immigration policy making amounts to reversing the factors underlying punitive immigration policy making, as is implied by current literature.MethodsWe utilize data from the National Conference of State Legislatures from 2005 to 2012 to uncover the puzzling enactment of beneficial state immigration laws during a period of high anti‐immigrant sentiment and budgetary declines in the 50 states.ResultsBeneficial immigration policy making is not a reversal of the process that underlines punitive immigration policy making and is particularly responsive to the need generated by immigrant population size, regardless of the documentation status of the beneficiary.ConclusionThe passage of beneficial immigration policies requires further analysis, as it is not as simple as reversing the process that produces punitive immigration policies.

This article uses the concepts of intersectionality and linked fate to understand the relationship between group identification and political behavior among lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) and non-LGBTQ Latinx individuals. Drawing on the 2016 Collaborative Multiracial Post-Election Survey (CMPS), we find that LGBTQ Latinx respondents report feelings of linked fate to both the Latinx and LGBTQ community, and that LGBTQ Latinx respondents exhibit more political participation than their non-LGBTQ Latinx counterparts. We then find that Latinx and LGBTQ linked fate are significant predictors of participation for non-LGBTQ respondents, and LGBTQ linked fate to predict LGBTQ Latinx participation. Finally, we provide evidence that suggests that feeling linked fate toward more than one marginalized group does not necessarily translate into participation in a greater number of political activities, demonstrating the complexity of group identification for predicting political participation. This study contributes to the theorizing of linked fate and political participation by deploying an intersectional lens that challenges assumptions of Latinx and LGBTQ intragroup political coherence and illuminates the complex effects that different kinds of linked fate have on political participation.

AbstractThe Great Recession of late 2007 through 2009 had profound negative economic impacts on the U.S. states, with 49 states experiencing revenue decreases in their 2009 budgets representing more than $67.2 billion USD. Also during this period, states enacted a record number of laws related to immigrants residing in their states. We make use of data from the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) to examine punitive immigration policy enactment from 2005 to 2012 and conduct a state comparative study using cross-sectional time-series analysis to examine the potential ways in which the economic recession and changing demographics in the states have impacted punitive state immigration policy making. We hypothesize that although anti-immigrant anxieties are driven in part by economic insecurity, they are also impacted by the presence of a large or growing proportion of racialized immigrants. We find that increases in state Hispanic populations and state economic stressors associated with the recession have both led to a greater number of enacted punitive state immigration policies. In addition, we find that changes in the non-Hispanic white populations in the states are also impacting the expression of anti-immigrant attitudes in state policy during this period.