Tuesday, Nov. 13, 2012

CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP) -- A federal judge is revisiting a lawsuit challenging South Carolina's tough new immigration law.

U.S. District Judge Richard Gergel holds a hearing Tuesday in Charleston. Last year, he blocked most of the law from taking effect. Since then, the U.S. Supreme Court has tossed out much of the Arizona law on which the South Carolina statute was based.

Gergel had blocked sections of the South Carolina law, making it a state crime not to carry immigration paperwork or for illegal immigrants to transport or house themselves.

He also blocked the requirement that police check the immigration status of those they pull over if officers suspect they are in the country illegally. But the Supreme Court let that provision in the Arizona law stand.

(Copyright 2012, The Associated Press)