On May 26, the Supreme Court upheld the Legal Arizona Workers Act of 2007. Now any business in the Grand Canyon State that knowingly or intentionally hires undocumented workers can lose their business license. If they are caught with a second offense within three years, they can be shut down. The law also requires employers to use E-Verify to check whether prospective hires are authorized to work.
As an attorney and firm believer in the need for comprehensive immigration reform, I found the Court's decision troubling. It signals that states can continue to experiment with anti-illegal immigration initiatives. Eight states already have laws similar to Arizona's Legal Worker Act. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, this year there have been 279 bills in 44 states focusing on penalties for businesses that hire illegal immigrants. But a patchwork of local immigration laws on is no substitute for a coherent national policy.
While punishing employers for hiring illegal workers is a good idea, Arizona's law has not been shown to reduce illegal immigration. In 2008, the first year it was in effect, state income tax collection dropped 13%. But sales tax revenues on food and clothing remained fairly steady. The Arizona Republic, economists, and researchers have all concluded that the law has sent unauthorized workers into the underground economy, not back to Mexico. The law shifted people into informal employment, resulting in a drop in much-needed tax revenue.
In upholding Arizona's law, the Court also approved the mandatory use of E-Verify. With this program, employers check the names of prospective employees against a database maintained by the Social Security Administration and the Department of Homeland Security.
One problem with E-Verify is that it often does not detect unauthorized workers. A 2009 study by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services found that E-Verify cleared 54% of illegal immigrants to work.
In his majority opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts noted that E-Verify clears 98% of new hires to work. Yet the system poses a real hurdle for those incorrectly identified as unauthorized to work. This could be almost anyone, from those who have married, divorced or changed their name, to those unlucky enough to be the victim of a clerical error. The Government Accounting Office (GAO) estimates that taking E-Verify national would result in 164,000 workers a year being incorrectly tagged as not eligible to work. Arizona's law allows only eight working days to fix errors before a person must be fired. By the way, good luck with that. The GAO has called the process of fixing errors in the federal government database "formidable."
Although the government promotes E-Verify as "Fast, Easy, and Free," it places a significant burden on small businesses. Bloomberg estimates that if E-Verify were to go national, small businesses would have to spend $2.6 billion in time, training, and productivity to become compliant. E-Verify can be a hassle for big corporations, too. In 2008, Intel reported that 12% of its workforce was incorrectly tagged as ineligible to work.
In his dissenting opinion, Justice Stephen Breyer was rightly concerned by an unintended result of Arizona's law. Employers, faced with the risk of penalties or the loss of their business, will be reluctant to hire those who look or sound foreign-born. This opens the door for discrimination against Latinos, legal residents, or anyone who doesn't "look" American.
In the wake of the Court's ruling, the Obama Administration must ensure that the anti-discrimination provisions of employment laws are zealously enforced. The government must also invest in improving E-Verify's accuracy. Still, the program is a compliance tool, and was never intended to be enforcement option. It is not going to create jobs; its consequences may be the opposite. Unfortunately, the Court's decision shows disregard for immigration policy, economic reality, and civil rights.
Follow Raul A. Reyes on Twitter: www.twitter.com/RaulAReyes
Why? Why would continuing the efforts of further securing this great nation against those who wish it harm be a bad thing Mr. Reyes? Why is it troubling to suggest this nation wants to know who is entering its borders and why? Do you assume that everyone who invades this country is only Hispanic and looking for a job, Mr Reyes? How self centered are your ideals? Why?
E-Verify requires a SS#, Illegals cannot get one..they in the alternatvier use the ITIN # which the IRS hands out like candy on Easter...this practice needs to end. THis is why so many Illegals appear legal when checked.
E-Verify is not difficult to use, so far over 100,000 companies have signed up to use the FREE service voluntarily...this article is factually inaccurate.
...as an attourney, you should be well aware that states have the RIGHT to do such. According to FEDERAL law, each state has the RIGHT to sanction it's businesses. Guess what? This is exactly what this law does - it sanctions businesses based on hiring practices.
I disagree wholeheartedly with you, Mr. Reyes. The Supreme Court hit the mark exactly by agreeing with the law.
What can be possibly be wrong with trying to improve on a system that we know has flaws? Isn't that what the left has been screaming about for some time now, reform?
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Unfortunately, "comprehensive immigration reform" means "amnesty." We had one of those before, and even George Bush knew that fool me once... you can't get fooled again!
What we really need is less immigration. We have too many people as it is, so many that we don't even have jobs for all of them. Why do we need immigrants under these conditions? We don't.
And we also need to raise the standards bar. Why do we take in immigrants who hit the welfare rolls the moment they step foot on our soil? Why do we take in immigrants who aren't literate even in their own languages and whose only skill is manual labor?
As for the objection to going after employers, isn't that exactly what you immigration defenders use to say should be done? Don't go after the poor illegals, you said. Go after the employers! Well, that's what's being done, and now the complaints are coming in. Why? Because what you really want is unlimited immigration.
I wonder if the entire immigration debate is as polarized in the US as it is here in these comment sections... Probably not.
I, for one, still am of the opinion that excessive protectionism always backfires. Of course, today, the US doesn't seem to need any help from Mexico and her citizens, not even that they be cooperative on important concerns of the US people and government, like national security and counter-terrorism. Also, the state of the Mexican economy does not give them much leverage right now.
Being the wealthiest nation in the world for over a century, the US trades with almost every single nation on Earth, so it's to be expected that some will be more, others less disgruntled about economical or immigration protectionism.
In the other hand, the US has only 2 (make it 3) bordering nations, yet they handle the immigration "problem" so poorly. Many countries have many more neighbors yet they manage to keep the discontent to a minimum.
I'm trying hard not to think it's an ethnic or cultural issue. I guess I'll have to try harder.
We cannot get universal health care or other needed social programs as long as we have no control over the numbers of people who can come in. The cost of lower wages is reflected in the tax returns for American workers and thus reduces the governments ability to get revenue. Those costs are NOT figured into the immigration stats.
The FACT is that no matter what reform is passed or not, the US will still be a magnet for much of the world and they will come legally or illegally. Those who cannot get in legally such as criminals, will still try. The only way to stop such unwanted people is to have a complete layered security system which extends from the border to ALL of the US, which includes making it near impossible to get a job here.
"The only way to stop such unwanted people is to have a complete layered security system[...]"
I have a suggestion for another way to stop the unwanted people. I know most won't like it, but I still feel like sharing.
Migration is, by definition, the movement of people across borders. Since the dawn of mankind, people have migrated for various reasons. Often though, the number one reason is because their original location faced resource depletion or climatic discomfort.
So my suggestion would be: fight world poverty to the point of eradication. If all places in the world provide the same standard of living the US people enjoy (economically, socially, legally and otherwise), then it would be unlikely people would migrate.
But if someone would argue that it's not the US' fault that other countries are poor, because people born in the US are somehow gifted with greater ingeniousness than those of other nations... Then I guess my original point about it being a ethnic/racial issue is validated.
Face it: it isn't "a burden on small businesses" to require them to obey the law of this land. You can work to change the law, eliminate all visa requirements and documentation requirements and all of that, if you want to and if you can. But until you succeed in doing that, "it's the law," and thousands of our ancestors passed through Ellis Island in scrupulous compliance with that law.
Let's also be blunt about one more thing: if you're in this country without documentation, you're an agricultural Slave or an industrial non-indentured Slave. And, yeah, I use that Capitalized Word very matter-of-factly, as being the most descriptive word for their actual condition. Which is reprehensible, and illegal. "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude ..."
Why don't mexican-americans work to improve living conditions in mexico so they don't need to be illegal aliens?
One must assume that virtually every mexican living here knows of several illegals and likely has several relatives here who are illegals. Due to the sheer numbers and the reported assistance they all get once here. 12-20 million illegals and about 30 million here legally.
One of the biggest culprits is our ridiculous family reunification laws that allow uneducated, elderly and low income immigrants before highly needed and educated ones. So many the illegals are on the waiting list to come here and they just move in with their family.
We should end most family reunification except immediate family and minor children only.