Leftist SEIU Unhappy with Obama on Immigration
Written by Daniel Sayani
Monday, 21 March 2011 17:36


While leftist immigration advocates typically view the Obama administration as an ally, one of the most important players in both Democratic Party politics and the debate on illegal immigration — the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) — is for the first time openly criticizing the Department of Homeland Security's shift in enforcement efforts. SEIU is the nation’s largest, most leftist, and most politically-active labor union, whose membership is comprised of nurses, home health aides, custodians, superintendents, and other such workers.

The Obama administration has shifted the emphasis of enforcement away from workplace raids — which immigrant advocates have long described as punishing immigrant workers instead of their employers — and toward so-called "I-9 audits," in which federal agents ask companies to verify their employees' legal status.

Though groups pushing to legalize most immigrant workers are broadly uncomfortable with the audits — which often cost workers their jobs — they have largely avoided criticizing the administration publicly. But SEIU has seen hundreds of members lose their jobs after I-9 audits: According to the union, 1,200 SEIU janitors in Minneapolis were fired following an I-9 audit last December, and just this week, 250 SEIU janitors in Minneapolis were fired after an I-9 audit, adding to 500 in the area who were fired from Chipotle Mexican Grill, reports Ben Smith of Politico, after the company was scrutinized by Homeland Security officials.

In a statement, Javier Morillo, president of SEIU Local 26 in Minnesota, offers the following criticisms of the I-9 audits:

Under the leadership of Secretary Napolitano the federal government has become an employment agency for the country’s worst employers. With each I-9 audit, the government is systematically pushing hardworking people into the underground economy where they face exploitation. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) reports targeting egregious employers that exploit workers — but it’s become increasingly obvious that this policy is nothing short of lip service. Let’s be clear: I-9 audits, by definition, do not go after egregious employers who break immigration laws because many of them do not use I-9 forms. Human traffickers do not ask their victims for their social security cards.

Secretary [Janet] Napolitano, [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] Director [John] Morton and the agencies they represent are at the forefront of a damaging policy shift in this country — one in which good, hardworking people are hand-delivered to the underground economy. SEIU fights for economic justice across this country, and we can no longer sit silently while communities are devastated by reckless policies.

The specific immigration policy in question, I-9 audits, is also known as the E-Verify program. ICE Spokesman Shawn Neudauer says that ICE offers a Mutual Agreement between Government and Employers, a voluntary program which assists employers in developing a stabler and more secure workforce by offering free education and training on proper hiring procedures, fraudulent document detection, the use of the E-Verify employment eligibility verification program, and anti-discrimination procedures.

SEIU head Eliseo Medina (whose subversive leadership in the immigration movement is explored in The John Birch Society presentation "Constitution SÃ*, Amnesty No"), however, expresses the opposition of the labor union to the E-Verify program. SEIU claims that enforcing immigration laws in the workplace is a jobs killer, and that the E-Verify program “further delays immigration reform.â€