South Carolina could be the next stop for protests, international attention and controversy over immigration.
Early Friday morning, South Carolina legislators briefly discussed requiring illegal immigrants to register with the state's tax agency and pay a $50 fee.
The measure came up early Friday morning as debate stretched past midnight on the state's $5 billion budget. The budget passed the senate just before 5:30 a.m.
Under Sen. Larry Grooms' measure, people who can't prove they registered could be jailed.
The Bonneau Republican withdrew the amendment when legislators agreed to include it in a stand-alone bill that might come up later in the session.
On Thursday, Rep. Eric Bedingfield, R-Greenville, introduced a bill that he says is "virtually the same" as the Arizona immigration law that was signed recently.
"It provides a procedure for verifying a person's immigration status under certain circumstances and provides for the arrest of a person suspected of being present in the United States unlawfully," Bedingfield says.
He says it wouldn't usually be used by police to stop someone, but would more likely be used to check the legal status of someone who had been stopped or arrested for something else.
The bill faces a tough fight to become law this year.
May 1st is the crossover deadline, meaning a bill has to have passed either the House or the Senate by May 1st to have a realistic chance of becoming law. If it hasn't passed by then, it has to be a two-thirds vote just to be considered.
Since May 1st is on a Saturday this year and lawmakers adjourn for the week on Thursdays, April 29 became the crossover deadline. That was the day Bedingfield introduced the bill.
He says he's confident he can get a committee hearing and a vote in the House.
"I do not discount the fact that, when it goes to the Senate, it'll require a two-thirds majority to be taken up there. And that'll be up to the people of South Carolina to speak out to the South Carolina Senate and voice their opinion on whether or not it should be done now," Bedingfield says.
In Greenville Thursday night, we found people on both sides of the issues, the majority saying, they sympathize with both sides. Immigrants who come here looking for work, and the need to regulate illegal immigration.
You can read the entire bill here.
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