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Audit: Fines for hiring illegal immigrants plummeted

By MICHAEL DOYLE
McClatchy Newspapers
19-JUN-06

WASHINGTON -- Federal agents arrested 953 illegal immigrants at worksites in 2000, congressional investigators reported Monday. By 2004, the worksite arrests fell to 159. Likewise, 178 employers received notice of a potential fine for hiring illegal immigrants in 2000. By 2004, only three employers received the fine notices.

"It's no wonder that many employers view enforcement as a remote possibility, and any civil penalties as a cost of doing business," Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas said Monday. "And it is also no wonder that many Americans are skeptical that the federal government is serious about enforcing the laws."

Even in California, home to more illegal immigrants than any other state, authorities generally have lagged in enforcing a sweeping 1986 immigration law.

The last time a California employer paid a fine for hiring illegal immigrants was in 1999, a database maintained by the Center for Immigration Studies shows. (www.cis.org/sanctions/)

"They've moved most of the enforcement to the border, rather than to the interior," Manuel Cunha, president of the Fresno, Calif.-based Nisei Farmers League, said Monday. "Me, I'm happy to have the enforcement at the border."

Cornyn and Cunha are now clashing in the immigration reform fight that has entered an ambiguous new phase on Capitol Hill. Cunha backs a comprehensive bill that includes an ambitious agricultural guest-worker program. Cornyn, while saying he supports a comprehensive bill, opposes the measure passed last month by the Senate.

The House and Senate bills both would fold the nation's 5.6 million employers into an electronic verification system, to check worker eligibility. The House bill gives employers up to six years to check all workers, while the Senate bill requires employers to check new workers within 18 months.

"It's an aggressive timeframe," said an understated Stewart Baker, assistant secretary of the Department of Homeland Security.

As chairman of the Senate immigration subcommittee, and as part of the pre-negotiation maneuvering, Cornyn summoned Baker and the Government Accountability Office to a hearing Monday. The GAO auditors concluded that worksite enforcement "has been a relatively low priority," in part because of an increasing emphasis on anti-terrorism efforts since the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

In 1999, for instance, the Immigration and Naturalization Service devoted the equivalent of 240 full-time staffers to worksite enforcement. By 2003, this fell to 90.

Bush administration officials said Monday they have since become more aggressive. They called, as well, for new changes that include stiffer fines and the opportunity to pursue employers who "negligently" hire illegal immigrants. This would be easier than the current standard of "knowingly" hiring an illegal worker.

"We have to take this well beyond a cost of doing business, and make it something much more painful," Baker said.

The Senate bill would double the fines that employers could face for knowingly hiring illegal workers, to $20,000 per worker. The House bill would boost this maximum to $40,000. But such provisions, and the burdens associated with new employment verification requirements, cause business lobbyists to scrutinize the whole bill very carefully.

"We're reviewing the entire issue of immigration reform," said California Chamber of Commerce Vice President Vince Sollitto, "and we have not come to a conclusion yet."

Although the Senate passed its immigration reform bill on May 25, and the House passed its border security bill last December, they remain far apart. The House hasn't named its negotiators yet; in part, because the Senate bill includes a tax provision that subjects it to a potential procedural challenge.

"I think they can sit on their butts," Cunha said, "but then can also be voted out in November if they don't do anything."

Still, Cunha indicated that quiet discussions are taking place behind the scenes among House leaders. He predicted House negotiators would be named within two weeks, leading to formal negotiations in July.





(Distributed by Scripps-McClatchy Western Service.)

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