Obama Administration to Crack Down on Illegal Immigrant Hiring
Janet Napolitano, head of Homeland Security announced on May 19th that the Obama Administration will intensify efforts enacted under the Bush regime to crack down on employers that knowingly hire illegal immigrants.
Napolitano said that the DHS which includes the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement service ("ICE") and the United States Citizen and Immigration Services ("CIS") will focus its efforts on employers rather than on the employee as it attempts to eliminate illegal hiring.
Recognizing that the bulk of illegal immigration is because there is a demand for their services in the US, Napolitano said that "Before we go in and arrest a bunch of workers, we need to make sure we've done what we need to do to prepare a case against the employer if there's a basis to believe that an employer is knowingly hiring illegal immigrants." In order to do so, the DHS will bolster its ability to determine what employers actually know about their employee's immigration status. To do so, it will increase the number of audits it performs of Employee Eligibility Verification forms or I- 9 forms as they are commonly known by employers. To date such audits have been few and far between but employers can expect them to increase as the new Administration steps up its enforcement efforts
It also appears from comments made that there will be wider use of the controversial E Verify program. This federal program which is administered by CIS is designed to allow employers to check that employees and new hires are providing accurate required information such as Social Security numbers and other documents. Although opponents contend that the E Verify program has many errors and has nearly a 11% error rate, Obama's 2010 budget includes $112 million or a 12% increase over last year to improve the accuracy of E verify and encourage more employers to use it.
Napolitano notes "There are a whole host of investigative techniques you an use" if you want to get at the people making money off the hiring of illegal immigrants, rather than simply rack up bigger arrest numbers of the workers themselves. Employers can expect their workforce to subject to stricter scrutiny as the Obama administration cracks down on illegal immigration. Audits of the I-9 forms on file should be the first line of defense as employers prepare for this new level of scrutiny.
Image: wordpress.com
