March 21, 2024
Mr. Charlie Baker
President of the NCAA
700 W. Washington Street
Indianapolis, IN 46202
On April 6-8, the Valley of the Sun will once again host the NCAA Men's Final Four, a
point of pride for our state and a showcase to the world of the state we all love. When
your organization selected Arizona as its 2024 location, you chose a welcoming state
with a growing economy where communities have worked hard to put a dark history of
bigotry, discrimination, and racial profiling in the rearview mirror when major portions of
2010's controversial Senate Bill 1070 were set aside as unconstitutional. Hispanics now
make up a third of our state, and our economic buying power has doubled in our
economy since 2015 to nearly $50 billion a year.
But, as the games near tip-off, that reputation, that positive economic trajectory, and
most importantly, our rights as Latinos and people of color in this state are once again
at risk.
On March 4, Governor Katie Hobbs vetoed Senate Bill 1231, an unconstitutional
measure that would have legalized and encouraged racial profiling by police and divided
our communities and our state along the same lines as Senate Bill 1070 just over a
decade ago. That bill cost our state hundreds of millions of dollars in damage to our
economy, especially to our agricultural and tourism industries. We hope that you would
agree with the Governor's decision and would agree that locating a tournament or a
convention in a state where residents can be targeted and detained because of the
color of their skin is a tacit endorsement of that policy. If you remember, Arizona lost out
on the 1993 Super Bowl because a bigoted previous Governor rescinded a holiday for
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and we did not host our first Super Bowl until 1996 after
voters spoke up and passed our current King holiday.
The Governor's veto was a welcome development, but Arizona's business community
and economy faces another pending threat. First, Republicans have threatened to
continue passing the same bill until the Governor relents, and if she doesn’t, they will
take the measure to the 2024 Arizona ballot. Additionally, House Concurrent Resolution
2060, a profoundly discriminatory and anti-business companion measure that could also
end up on the 2024 statewide ballot, would burden Arizona businesses of all sizes with
extensive new requirements to use E-Verify for subcontractors, to obtain business
licenses and to obtain public services. This measure has cleared the House, and if
passed by the Senate and approved by voters, it would duplicate other effective
measures that bar undocumented Arizona residents from obtaining services and would
overlay confusing and costly new burdens on businesses.
We do not need another measure that damages our reputation, spreads fear, and
divides our state while increasing costs for businesses and prices for consumers. What
we do need is your voice. We urge you to speak out against this legislation by joining
more than 100 diverse business leaders who have publicly objected. And we encourage
you to make future location decisions accordingly.
Immigration policy is a federal responsibility. States cannot and should not have
patchwork immigration laws. Join us in opposing HCR 2060 and in demanding
Congress and the Administration to set aside partisan differences and get to work
passing a negotiated bill to send out border states like ours the resources we need
immediately to handle this ongoing humanitarian crisis.
