Thread: Critics: E-Verify Proposal Flouts Law

Critics: E-Verify Proposal Flouts Law
by Mickey McCarter
Tuesday, 12 August 2008

Congress intends the system to be voluntary, says workforce coalition

The Bush administration is deliberately attempting to thwart congressional will that the E-Verify employment verification system remain voluntary for all US employers with a proposed regulation that would compel federal contractors to use the system, according to comments submitted Monday by a workforce coalition advocating a private sector system.

In a proposed rule published in Volume 73, No. 114, of the Federal Register on June 12, the US Department of Defense, General Services Administration, and National Aeronautics and Space Administration suggested their contractors should use E-Verify to authenticate that their employees are eligible to work in the United States.

The Human Resource Initiative for a Legal Workforce coalition Monday criticized the proposed rule, claiming Congress consistently has rejected attempts to pass laws to require use of E-Verify by federal contractors. In addition, the coalition argued that Congress intended the E-Verify system to be voluntary for any employer, as described in the 1996 immigration law that first authorized it as a pilot (PL 104-20.

The law originally authorized the pilots under the Justice Department, noting that "the Attorney General may not require any person or other entity to participate in a pilot program" except for the executive and legislative branches of the US government, which were required to participate when hiring.

"The HR Initiative also pointed out in its submission that the proposed rule imposes new liabilities on federal contractors and subcontractors without providing adequate protections. In addition, the filing detailed the many shortcomings in E-Verify that render the system inadequate for employers and far from foolproof," the coalition said in a statement.

The proposed rule actually suggests exempting contractors when compliance would not be cost effective.

"[This rule] was written to apply the requirements in a manner to ensure effective compliance by the contractor community, but it exempts certain prime contracts and subcontracts when the cost of compliance would likely outweigh the benefits, e.g., COTS [commercial off the shelf] items," the rule said.

Regulators estimated the rule would go into effect sometime in fiscal 2009, prompting 168,324 contractors and subcontractors to enroll in E-Verify to check their 3.8 million workers through the Social Security Administration database, costing $550.3 million over the 10 years from 2009-18.

The HR Initiative recently endorsed a five-year reauthorization of E-Verify (HR 6633) passed by the House July 31 as a reasonable interim step but continued to advocate for the alternative employment eligibility system proposed by the New Employee Verification Act (HR 5515), which would require the verification of new hires at the state level through the creation of a new Electronic Employment Verification System (EEVS) to check their identities.
http://hstoday.us/content/view/4670/128/

SO ONLY GOVERNMENT CONTRACTOR HAVE TO E-VERIFY IF THEY WANT TO!

NO- NO;

WE WANT EVERYONE USING THE E-VERIFY IN THE COUNTRY