Thread: COMMENTARY : NO-MATCH LETTERS STILL PENDING

'No-match' letters still pending, officials say; U.S. wants to reinstate warnings to employers

By: EDWARD SIFUENTES - North County Times

Sunday, November 18, 2007

The federal government is looking for a way to reinstate a plan to send written warnings to employers it suspects of hiring illegal immigrants.

The Department of Homeland Security planned to start sending letters to employers in September, but U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer blocked it last month after civil, labor and business organizations sued the government.

Officials at the Department of Homeland said the agency may rewrite the rule to eliminate some concerns from the judge, who said the plan would impose hardships on businesses and the workers.

"We're currently seeing what we can do to address the concerns that the judge entered in order to see whether we can get the injunction lifted, and then go forward with this regulation," Michael Chertoff, Homeland Security secretary, told Congress earlier this month.

Labor groups and others filed the lawsuit challenging the plan, saying it would put a heavy burden on employers and could cause many legal immigrants and U.S. citizens to lose their jobs over innocent paperwork glitches.

The government argued that the rule doesn't impose a heavy burden on employers and that some businesses oppose the plan because they want to avoid liability for hiring undocumented workers.

Each year, the Social Security Administration sends letters to about 140,000 employers pointing out problems between the information sent by the employers and the information in its database. The letters involve an estimated 8 million workers each year, according to the Social Security Administration.

Much of the mismatched information is often attributed to illegal immigrant workers, who use false information to gain employment.

Under a new regulation, the so-called "no-match" letters from the Social Security Administration would include a letter from the Department of Homeland Security explaining that employers risk criminal and civil sanctions by hiring illegal immigrants.

It would also include what it called "safe harbor" steps that businesses can take to avoid being held responsible and are meant to protect employers who attempt to comply with the letter. The employer would have 90 days to resolve any problems.

However, Breyer said in his ruling that:

n the "safe harbor" steps were too strict and could result in legal workers being fired from their jobs;

n the rule went too far, saying employers who followed those steps could not be sued for discrimination;

n the department did not follow proper procedures in issuing a regulation that would result in substantial impact to businesses.

Immigration attorneys said the government may change the language and eliminate some provisions to reflect the judge's ruling and reintroduce the regulation.

"My best guess is that the Department of Homeland Security will go back to the drawing board and change what it thinks will satisfy the judge's concerns," said Carl Borden, associate counsel for the California Farm Bureau Federation.

Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, an organization that supports tighter immigration controls, said he was skeptical whether the Bush Administration would push to enforce the regulation and whether changing it would render it toothless.

"We don't really know whether they're all that serious," Krikorian said.

Earlier this month, a group of more than 80 representatives, including Rep. Brian Bilbray, R-Solana Beach, introduced the Secure America with Verification and Enforcement Act, a bill that includes a provision requiring employers to verify their employees' status through a federal database.

After efforts in Congress to reform immigration laws failed earlier this year, the Department of Homeland Security decided to use current laws to bolster immigration enforcement, including the new work site rules.

Chertoff said the changes have been effective, pointing to statistics such as an increase in work site arrests. Since 2002, arrests at workplaces have increased from 485 to over 4,000 this year.

Immigration attorneys have said the government's efforts are also making employers nervous.

Earlier this year, the founder and a vice president of Golden State Fence Co. - one of California's largest fence-building companies with offices in Oceanside and Riverside -- were sentenced to probation and large fines for knowingly hiring illegal immigrants.

"This has been an incredibly effective strategy of really putting the fear of God into employers," said Laura Lichter, a Denver-based immigration attorney.

On Friday, a spokesman for the Social Security Administration said the agency will not issue no-match letters to employers this year. The letters are typically sent out in batches starting in March or April, according to spokesman Mark Hinkle.

Due to the lawsuit, the letters were delayed. The administration needed to make revisions and will not start sending them out until about February or March, Hinkle said.

Contact staff writer Edward Sifuentes at (760) 740-3511 or esifuentes@nctimes.com.

http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2007/11 ... ogcomments

This seems silly to me.

I am so jaded, I think the government may have consulted a judge before announcing this program and wrote it in such a way it would have something to stop it.

Then they can say, 'See, we are trying.'

Well, they aren't trying, they haven't been trying for two decades now.

Originally Posted by Chertoff

the changes have been effective, pointing to statistics such as an increase in work site arrests. Since 2002, arrests at workplaces have increased from 485 to over 4,000 this year.

With millions of illegal aliens in this country 4,000 arrests is a joke and nothing more..

I do think the arrests and raids are jokes. They certainly are not cost effective.

With much less time and manpower, there are workplaces they could raid that would net several hundred - perhaps - thousands - so why are they working on smaller fish? So they can alert the media and say they are doing something?

Just my thoughts, but I feel like they are probably going either after smaller fish that don't donate anyway - or whose donations are so small they don't matter - or who donated to the wrong candidate.

Also, I have a feeling they alert the media everytime they are going to make a raid so they can get the sob stories all fixed in advance.

I also think they alert Mexico - so Mexico can get it's outrage worked up and go on TV.

Originally Posted by nntrixie

I do think the arrests and raids are jokes. They certainly are not cost effective.

It's a joke on us if they were doing what they should be doing the numbers would be more like 400,000. 4,000 is less than the number of anchor babies born every 3 weeks..