Obama Revives Bush Idea to Catch Illegal Workers

By Spencer S. Hsu
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, July 9, 2009



President Obama will abandon a controversial immigration crackdown, sought by his predecessor, to pressure U.S. companies to fire 9 million workers with suspect Social Security numbers, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano announced yesterday.

Instead, Obama will mandate that federal contractors confirm the identities of 4 million workers against federal databases beginning in September, pushing ahead under pressure from Senate Republicans with another long-stalled Bush administration initiative.

Napolitano said her department will rescind a 2007 rule, tied up in federal court, that would have sent Social Security "no-match" letters to 140,000 U.S. employers. The notices were to warn companies to resolve discrepancies or fire suspect workers within 90 days, or face criminal penalties.

Instead, she said, the Department of Homeland Security will take a "more modern and effective" approach, ordering an estimated 170,000 federal contractors to confirm employees' work documents against E-Verify, until now a voluntary electronic government system for companies to check new hires' immigration and Social Security data.

Combined with a renewed emphasis by the DHS on targeting companies that hire illegal immigrants with civil fines and audits instead of high-profile raids, the moves mark the clearest sign yet of Obama's efforts to chart a middle course on immigration enforcement, analysts said.

The administration's announcement appeared aimed at satisfying law-and-order conservatives on Capitol Hill, where Senate Republicans successfully amended Homeland Security's $43 billion 2010 budget yesterday to extend E-Verify to federal contractors and to expand construction of fencing on the U.S.-Mexico border.

"The American people have made it clear that immigration reform should start with better enforcement of the laws already on the books," said Sen. Jeff Sessions (Ala.), the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee. "Making [E-Verify] permanent and mandatory for federal contractors would be a big step toward meeting the public's expectations."

At the same time, Obama has told immigrant advocacy groups that Congress should try to overhaul the nation's immigration laws within the coming year with the support of business groups and organized labor, all of whom had bitterly opposed the no-match rule.

"The Obama administration is trying to find its voice and put forward a coherent enforcement strategy," said Angela Kelley, immigration analyst at the left-leaning Center for American Progress. "They're looking for solid footing on enforcement so they can move on to what is the unknown territory" of broader legislation addressing the fate of 12 million illegal immigrants and the future flow of foreign workers, she said.

The complexity of navigating a centrist course, however, was revealed yesterday by the mixed reaction to Napolitano's announcement.

As expected, business groups such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce hailed the decision to kill the no-match rule. Since October 2007, a federal judge had held up the rule, acknowledging arguments by critics that the Bush administration failed to consider the impact on small businesses and that the rule could lead to discrimination against many legal workers because of millions of errors in the government's Social Security databases.

But Angelo I. Amador, a spokesman for the Chamber, said business groups will continue to fight the contractor requirement in federal court, arguing that Congress never intended to make participation in the worker verification program mandatory.

"As of right now, our position remains that the rule as written is unconstitutional," Amador said.

On the other hand, Sen. Charles E. Schumer (N.Y.), who is leading Senate Democrats' efforts to draft a bill, said E-Verify does not go far enough. Instead, Schumer has proposed using a verification system based on workers' fingerprints, eye scans or other unique identifiers.

E-Verify cannot detect whether a person is stealing the identity of another legitimate worker, and a proposed fix -- requiring workers who are permanent residents or noncitizens to present photo IDs -- "invites discrimination and creates uncertainty for employers," Schumer said in a statement.

Amador said the split between the White House and Democratic lawmakers is confusing. "I would like to say otherwise, but . . . it's kind of unclear for us, from the perspective of negotiating with Democrats, who we should talk to," he said.

Rep. Jack Kingston (R-Ga.), who supports E-Verify, called the moves "a step forward and a step back." "How they could do this in one step and in another abandon no-match letters is a mystery that defies all," Kingston said in a statement. "It makes me wonder if the Administration is still playing games."

The Bush administration proposed mandatory use of E-Verify by 170,000 federal contractors in 2007, projecting that participation in the program would double in 10 years to cover 20 percent of annual U.S. hiring.

Business opposition stalled implementation until Obama took office, however, and he ordered further review. Napolitano said yesterday that the administration will push for "full implementation" for workers on contracts of more than $100,000 awarded after Sept. 8. More than a dozen states have passed similar legislation.

About 134,000 out of an estimated 6 million U.S. employers now voluntarily participate in the program, which was created in 1996.

On Friday, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, a DHS agency, announced that it had issued audit notices to 652 businesses -- more than in the previous year -- beginning what ICE director John Morton said will be a national strategy to reinvigorate the use of civil fines as well as criminal penalties, not just work-site raids, against employers.

"You're hearing it straight from the horse's mouth," Morton said in an interview. "We are auditing, we are adding civil enforcement, . . . we are adding a renewed emphasis on criminal enforcement. We are going to try to bring every enforcement tool that we have to bear on the problem."

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