Thread: Justice Seeks Delay in Court Challenge to Immigration Plan

Justice Seeks Delay in Court Challenge to Immigration Plan
Bush Administration Says It Will Modify Crackdown on Employers Hiring Undocumented Workers

By Spencer S. Hsu
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, November 25, 2007; Page A11

The Bush administration said Friday that it will modify its planned crackdown on U.S. companies that employ illegal immigrants, asking a federal judge to delay hearing a lawsuit brought by major American labor, business and farm organizations until the new strategy is completed.

In papers filed in San Francisco late Friday afternoon, Acting Assistant Attorney General Jeffrey S. Bucholtz told U.S. District Judge Charles R. Breyer that the Homeland Security Department is making unspecified changes to its plan to pressure employers to fire as many as 8.7 million workers with suspect Social Security numbers.

The Justice Department in court papers asked the judge to delay the case until March 24, or until a new program is ready.

On Oct. 10, Breyer barred the government from mailing Social Security "no-match" letters to 140,000 U.S. employers, citing serious legal questions about requiring companies to resolve questions about their employees' identities, fire them within 90 days, or else face potential fines and criminal prosecution.

President Bush made the initiative a priority in August after the Senate killed his proposed overhaul of immigration laws. In issuing a preliminary injunction, however, the judge cited plaintiffs' arguments that the Social Security Administration database includes so many errors that using it to enforce immigration laws would cause "staggering" disruptions at workplaces and discriminate against tens of thousands of legal workers.

The judge also said that the government failed to weigh the cost of the new regulation on small businesses as required.

"Certainly DHS believes that the court got it wrong," department spokeswoman Laura Keehner said. However, in modifying the program, "DHS is planning to provide an answer to the small number of minor issues that the judge raised in his opinion," she said.

Randel K. Johnson, a vice president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which joined the suit brought by the AFL-CIO and the American Civil Liberties Union, along with agriculture, restaurant and construction industry associations, said businesses are bracing for the new effort. "I hope they give the employer community adequate time to comment and do not just jam it through during the holidays, particularly given that this regulation covers all industries, across all sectors of the economy."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 01249.html

November 25, 2007
Revised Rule for Employers That Hire Immigrants
By JULIA PRESTON

The Bush administration will suspend its legal defense of a new rule issued in August to punish employers who hire illegal immigrants, conceding a hard-fought opening round in a court battle over a central measure in its strategy to curb illegal immigration, according to government papers filed late Friday in federal court.

Instead, the administration plans to revise the rule to try to meet concerns raised by a federal judge and issue it again by late March, hoping to pass court scrutiny on the second try. The rule would have forced employers to fire workers within 90 days if their Social Security information could not be verified.

The government’s proposal was a response to an indefinite delay to the rule ordered Oct. 10 by the judge, Charles R. Breyer of Northern District Court in San Francisco. Judge Breyer found that the government had failed to follow proper procedures in issuing the rule and that it should have completed a survey of its impact on small business.

He also found that the Social Security database the government would use to verify workers’ status was full of errors, so the rule could lead to the dismissal of many thousands of workers who were American citizens or legal immigrants.

In a four-page motion filed Friday, the government, without acknowledging any flaws in the original rule, asked Judge Breyer to suspend the case so the Department of Homeland Security could rewrite the rule and conduct the small-business survey, which it expects to do by March 24. The government said that it wanted to “prevent the waste of judicial resourcesâ€

Uh oh,watch out! Bush is going to "modify" the plan.That's code of course for changing the plan to coddle the pro-illegal alien groups that are trying to stop anything even resembling enforcement.Beware any talk of any "modifing" of any illegal immigration laws.You can bet that when President Bush speaks of modification,a "comprenhensive immigration plan" will surely be close behind. Will Senator Kennedy and Senator Mccain be the chief "modifiers'?That way we would have the modifiers,the amnesty crowd,and the "decider" working together. Modifiers-Amnesty-Decider=MAD

Bush and Chertoff will now huddle up and determine the best and greatest way to "gut" the no-match enforcement policy they so ballyhooed. It was all smoke and mirrors. I think the fix was in from the very beginning. The Bush administration made arrangements (or were sure that they law would be challenged by the ACLU and the usual suspects of open borders groups) that the action they proposed to pursue could be successfully challenged in front of the right court and be struck down. That way they could claim, "we tried to enforce the law against employers but the court wouldn't let us." It's what they wanted all along. The status quo of little to no enforcement.

the fix is in and it is as you say... Smoke and Mirrors to give the impression to the American people they are helpless because of the courts

All I know is I want him and Chertoff behind bars with no chance for parole

This court will not be worth a crap when the people take this country back from the Elitist fools

Geeez, I bet they are relieved they did not almost do something that might have worked!

W

The people need to SPEAK OUT AGAINST THIS. Time to get on talk radio again to get this stoped.

[quote="zeezil"]November 25, 2007
Revised Rule for Employers That Hire Immigrants
By JULIA PRESTON

The Bush administration will suspend its legal defense of a new rule issued in August to punish employers who hire illegal immigrants, conceding a hard-fought opening round in a court battle over a central measure in its strategy to curb illegal immigration, according to government papers filed late Friday in federal court.

Instead, the administration plans to revise the rule to try to meet concerns raised by a federal judge and issue it again by late March, hoping to pass court scrutiny on the second try. The rule would have forced employers to fire workers within 90 days if their Social Security information could not be verified.

The government’s proposal was a response to an indefinite delay to the rule ordered Oct. 10 by the judge, Charles R. Breyer of Northern District Court in San Francisco. Judge Breyer found that the government had failed to follow proper procedures in issuing the rule and that it should have completed a survey of its impact on small business.

He also found that the Social Security database the government would use to verify workers’ status was full of errors, so the rule could lead to the dismissal of many thousands of workers who were American citizens or legal immigrants.

In a four-page motion filed Friday, the government, without acknowledging any flaws in the original rule, asked Judge Breyer to suspend the case so the Department of Homeland Security could rewrite the rule and conduct the small-business survey, which it expects to do by March 24. The government said that it wanted to “prevent the waste of judicial resourcesâ€

This is going to give Bush more time to sink our country. Doesn't anyone understand that or care. He is buying time. His plans are well underway.

Somebody, please, explain to me how a judge can block the enforcement of our immigration laws. I thought the judge was there to keep prosecution and defense in line with the law after an arrest, a hearing, and filing for court action. I thought what this judge is doing happened on an appeal of a conviction and was decided by the supreme court. Now the judge gets to obstruct the law, interpret the law, change the law, and create the law.