Latino Chasm in the Mormon Church

It’s about immigration, but it’s also about faith. And in a tightly-knit group like the Latter Day Saints it feels like the Hatfield’s and McCoy’s (or the Garcia’s and Martinez’…it’s all relative).

Stephen Sandstrom and Tony Yapias are on the same side of the church but on opposite sides of politics.

Sandstrom, a Utah state representative, recently stated his position on immigration this way in the Los Angeles Times:

“This country is the greatest nation on Earth because God had a hand in its formation,’ said Sandstrom, 47. ‘A lot of that is because … we obey the rule of law. Turning a blind eye to illegal immigration jeopardizes the rule of law.'”

He’s proposed a bill that mirror’s Arizona’s sb1070, that requires police to determine the citizenship of people they stop and who they suspect are in the US illegally.

Yapias sees things differently:

“Every immigrant understands the pain and suffering of any family that’s separated,” Yapias said. “When Sandstrom or anyone else starts talking, it just opens up wounds…. What I don’t understand is how Sandstrom doesn’t get it — how two people of the same faith can be so far apart.”

This feud has been brewing since summer.  There’ve been dueling press conferences, interrupted by activists, and it wasn’t until this past November that the Mormon Church stepped in. As the LAT put it:

“…carefully lending its weight to Yapias’ position. It endorsed a set of principles issued by Utah business leaders who oppose Sandstrom’s legislation, and issued a statement calling for immigration policy to be made not just with an eye toward the rule of law, but also compassion and family unity.”

All the Church wanted to do, really, was moderate the debate, but now it’s a target in the fight. Latino immigration activists accuse the LDS Church of being timid in defending Latinos, who are joing the Mormon’s in droves. The other side, the immigration hard liners, have shut their pocket books and stopped their tithing.

Sandstrom’s may be an uphill battle. According to the Los Angeles Times,

“Although extremely conservative, Utah boasts some of the most illegal-immigrant-friendly laws in the nation, a condition long attributed to the Mormon Church’s calming influence. In addition to charging illegal immigrant students in-state tuition at state universities, Utah gives them “driving privilege cards” which function like driver’s licenses.”

So Utah and the Church seem stuck between the rule of law and it’s divine principles. But recently a group of citizen leaders devised what may be a compromise:

“Last month, a coalition of prominent business leaders and conservative intellectuals released the Utah Compact, which maps out principles for immigration reform that are in stark opposition to Sandstrom’s bill.”

This may be about the rule of law, but Yapias says it’s about family unity, and he had the last word:

“I believe that Sandstrom’s children and grandchildren will apologize to us someday,” Yapias said.