Thread: Immigration loophole leads to spread of fake-ID mills

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/nort ... fakes.html

By Leslie Berestein
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER

February 19, 2006

In the pre-dawn hours one late-November morning, federal agents with search warrants raided the Oceanside and Riverside offices of Golden State Fence Co., carting out boxes filled with payroll documents.

It was the second time in a year and a half that the Riverside-based fencing company was busted for hiring undocumented workers. During that period, federal investigators auditing the company's payroll records had found that 157 of its employees – close to one-third of the workers at the Oceanside and Riverside locations – were in the country illegally.

To get those jobs, nearly all of them had presented phony identification: Investigators found counterfeit green cards, Social Security cards and California identification cards. A criminal investigation into the company's hiring practices continues.

As politicians and activists raise the pitch of their arguments to stop illegal immigration at the border, scant attention has been paid to the legal loopholes that make it easy for employers to hire undocumented immigrants, creating an irresistible economic pull that undermines border enforcement.

Providing an easy in to the job market for these workers – and an easy out for most employers caught hiring them – are counterfeit documents.

While places such as Tijuana and Los Angeles remain hubs for phony-document manufacturers, San Diego is seeing a proliferation of counterfeiters. Last year, federal agents here discovered more than half a dozen document mills, compared with only one in 2004.

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Agents say improved technology has made it easier to set up mom-and-pop counterfeiting operations, while a growing service sector in San Diego has attracted low-wage workers.

“They're staying in San Diego, and there is a demand, and suppliers are trying to meet that demand,â€

Because investigators must prove an employer knowingly hired someone illegally, those who accept counterfeit documents tend to get off the hook. In the past three years, more than 350 employees have been found working illegally for local companies, but none of the companies has been prosecuted.

Twenty years ago, I held a beer license in the state of NC because I owned a store that sold beer and wine. Part of the responsibility that came along with that license was that I would NOT sell beer to minors. There were classes for myself and for my employees to teach us how to spot fake ID's and we had the right NOT to sell to anyone we had any reason to suspect was not of age or who we suspected was intoxicated. The law would back us up if the drunks and kids cried "discrimination." By the same token, if I, or one of my employees, sold beer to a seventeen year old, even if that kid was holding an ID that said he was 21, it wasn't a valid excuse. There was a little thing called common sense that was required.

Every business must have a license. Every employer must have an employer ID number. Some sort of responsibility must be attached to those privileges as well. People should be required to exercise some common sense. And now they even have a number they can call to verify a social security number.

I firmly believe that reinforcement should be written into the law prohibiting people from hiring illegal aliens that protects the employers from facing discrimination charges if they have reason to believe that a potential employee is not a legally authorized worker.

I don't like that word "unknowingly" because it gives them all a way out that they shouldn't be allowed. That same common sense rule that applies to selling beer should prevail as it applies to hiring workers. If someone speaks no English (naturalized citizens are required to be able to communicate in English), if someone has nothing but a drivers license and a social security card (which is easy to fake) saying who they are, the employer has every right to ask for additional ID. Birth certificates, passports, a credit card, a bank card, work ID, even a library card. I've shown my library card to cash checks before when they want three ID's. Established people have more than one piece of paper that can help to identify them.

Ag-workers and guest workers should not be allowed to go job hopping and that would eliminate the need to worry about their legality. Green card holders should be carrying a passport or some more substantial form of ID than a drivers license. And drivers licenses of people who are not US citizens should be marked somehow that would alert any potential employer or law enforcement agent. The renewal date should correspond with their visa renewal.

We all know that 80% of the matricula cards issued at Mexican consulates aren't worth the paper they are written on. Why can't employers be warned and then expected heed that warning?

I don't see why this would be so hard for the government to do. Do any of you?

Twenty years ago, I held a beer license in the state of NC because I owned a store that sold beer and wine. Part of the responsibility that came along with that license was that I would NOT sell beer to minors. There were classes for myself and for my employees to teach us how to spot fake ID's and we had the right NOT to sell to anyone we had any reason to suspect was not of age or who we suspected was intoxicated. The law would back us up if the drunks and kids cried "discrimination." By the same token, if I, or one of my employees, sold beer to a seventeen year old, even if that kid was holding an ID that said he was 21, it wasn't a valid excuse. There was a little thing called common sense that was required.

Excellent point JJ.