Washington, DC, USA. A new Arizona law that was signed on Friday (April 23) by Governor Jan Brewer gives local police in the state broad new enforcement powers to arrest illegal immigrants. The statute drew a direct rebuke from President Obama and revived long-stalled efforts to overhaul the country’s immigration laws.

“We in Arizona have been more than patient waiting for Washington to act,” Brewer, a Republican, said when announcing she would approve the law. “But decades of federal inaction and misguided policy have created a dangerous and unacceptable situation.”

Obama criticized the legislation at a Friday naturalization ceremony at the White House, where Janet Napolitano, Brewer’s predecessor as Arizona governor and Obama’s homeland security chief, gave the oath of citizenship. The president said Arizona’s new law showed why national immigration laws need to be overhauled.

Mobile, AL, USA. Federal officials are probing corruption in Alabama's bingo battle, another twist in the saga over whether the state should allow electronic bingo machines to raise money for local governments or charities.

Agents from the U.S. Department of Justice, the U.S. Attorney's office and the FBI say they have "substantial evidence of corruption" around a legislative battle to formally legalize the bingo machines (similar to slot machines), according to The New York Times. On April 11, the Birmingham News reported that at least two lawmakers had worn wires as part of the investigation after they had received offers from bingo lobbyists that they considered bribes.

Gov. Bob Riley, a Republican opposed to gambling, has been targeting bingo machines in his state for the past year. His task force on illegal gambling which has gone after bingo operators, in some cases raiding them in the middle of the night and hauling away the machines. About 100 parlors have already shut down, according to a Stateline report last month, and employees at the remaining operations are fearful for their jobs.

Washington, DC, USA. When President Barack Obama recently promised $8.3 billion in loan guarantees to help finance proposed nuclear reactors, Illinois State Senator Mike Jacobs pounced. It didn’t matter that the federal help was for a plant in another state — Georgia. Jacobs sensed that the politics of power were shifting in nuclear energy’s favor and that this would be a good time to try to overturn Illinois’ 23-year-old new plant moratorium.

Nuclear-power supporters in Illinois had tried this before with no success. This time, it was different. On March 15, Jacobs’ bill sailed through the state Senate by a vote of 40-to-1.

He’s hopeful of its chances in the state House. “It gave me cover,” says Jacobs, a Democrat, referring to Obama’s announcement. “The president has given us a green light.” The bill would make Illinois the first state in the country to overturn its own ban on new nuclear power plants. Residents likely wouldn’t see any immediate impact from the change. But it would signal a new willingness on the part of state officials to embrace an energy source that has been out of favor for a generation.

Washington, DC, USA. A casual observer of the health care debate might think the historic new federal law does little to help older Americans. In fact, emotional talk of "death panels" likely led more than a few people to expect bad news for end-of-life care.

It’s true that the new law promises to pay only a tiny share of the biggest and fastest growing health care bill — long-term care for the elderly and other adults with disabilities. Still, attention to the issue may end up paying much bigger future dividends.

The law, known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, includes the first-ever national long-term care insurance plan — called Community Living Assistance Services and Supports (CLASS) — a federally administered program financed through payroll deductions. If a significant number of people sign up for the voluntary program — a heavily debated issue — individual long-term care benefits could defray a portion of states’ costs.

Washington, DC, USA. Under separate state Supreme Court decisions issued days apart in Georgia and Wisconsin last month, two men who did not commit sex crimes must register as sex offenders.

Their offense — a crime known as “false imprisonment” — was deemed to warrant inclusion on public registries even if there was nothing sexual about it.

The cases reflect a growing debate in the courts and in legislatures. As states crack down on sex offenders, including less serious and even non-sex offenders in online registries, does the value of such registries diminish?

A decade ago, when James Smith was 17, he and an accomplice forced another 17-year-old into a car with them near Green Bay, Wisconsin. The two wanted to collect drug money from a friend of the boy, and they forced him go along for the ride, making clear to him that if he didn’t, “he is going to get what is coming to him,” according to the criminal complaint in the case. After the incident, Smith was convicted of a crime called “false imprisonment.”