Plan to Target Businesses That Employ Immigrants Draws Fire

By Spencer S. Hsu
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, September 8, 2007; A08



A pending Bush administration crackdown against U.S. companies that employ illegal immigrants faced growing opposition yesterday, as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and several large industry groups joined an AFL-CIO lawsuit to halt the program, and the U.S. Small Business Administration said it was considering whether to take their side.

"We are evaluating that," said Keith Holman, a spokesman for the Small Business Administration (SBA), when asked whether the agency would file a friend-of-the-court brief in the legal challenge to a drive by the Department of Homeland Security and the Social Security Administration to pressure U.S. companies to fire as many as 8 million workers who have suspect Social Security numbers.

An SBA official, speaking anonymously because he was not authorized to address the issue, said, "The fact we would be considering doing an amicus brief, that we haven't rejected it out of hand, suggests there may be problems" with the program.

A federal judge on Aug. 31 barred the White House from mailing Social Security "no-match letters" this month to an estimated 140,000 employers. The letters were to warn businesses of the new rule requiring employers to fire workers who fail to resolve discrepancies in their records within 90 days, or else face potential fines and even criminal liability for hiring illegal immigrants. U.S. District Judge Maxine M. Chesney in San Francisco set a hearing for Oct. 1.

The AFL-CIO, several local labor groups and the American Civil Liberties Union allege that the DHS is exceeding its authority to enforce immigration laws and is misusing an Social Security database in a way that could lead to workplace discrimination against countless law-abiding workers, including native-born Americans, immigrant citizens and legal residents.

The groups charged that the Social Security Administration has acknowledged errors in records of 17.8 million legal U.S. workers, who could be caught in the dragnet. The agency has determined that as many as 10 percent of U.S. workers have suspect numbers, for reasons including immigration fraud but also typographical errors, name changes and hyphenated surnames.

Yesterday, several members of the Essential Worker Immigration Coalition, which represents U.S. business sectors with large numbers of immigrant workers, such as the service industry, filed papers to join the case.

"Using the no-match letter as a tool to enforce immigration laws is wasteful, costly to the business community, and an awkward attempt . . . to commandeer the Social Security retirement and disability systems to enforce the nation's immigration laws," the groups said. Parties include the U.S. and San Francisco chambers of commerce, the 900-member Golden Gate Restaurant Association, and trade groups representing U.S. roofing contractors, nursing and landscape businesses, franchisees and produce companies.

The groups also alleged that the administration failed to complete an economic impact assessment as required under the Regulatory Flexibility Act of 1980 when a new government rule will likely impose significant costs on businesses with fewer than 500 workers. It is that alleged failure that might draw the SBA into the case.

Spokesmen for the DHS and the Office of Management and Budget did not immediately return telephone calls seeking comment.

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