U.S. to target hiring illegals

http://www.venturacountystar.com/news/2 ... -illegals/

Employers put on notice....

When they torpedoed President Bush's immigration-reform bill, congressional Republicans challenged the president to enforce existing laws more vigorously. Now his administration has taken them up on it.

In announcements in Washington from the secretaries of homeland security and commerce and reinforced by a White House pronouncement from the elder George Bush's Kennebunkport vacation home, the administration announced a nationwide crackdown on illegal immigration.

The crackdown includes the usual remedies β€” a speedup in construction of the border fence, hiring more Border Patrol agents and stepped-up detentions of apprehended illegals. But it also includes a step the government has shied away from β€” going after employers with illegal immigrants on their payrolls. They will be required to fire workers with phony Social Security numbers and take more stringent measures to verify citizenship.

It is no accident that these measures were announced just as members of Congress had dispersed to their districts for a long recess. President Bush could have just as easily done this immediately after the immigration bill failed in June. The announcement of the crackdown is likely to be popular with the public, giving Republicans a badly needed short-term boost, but the administration is also betting that, long term, the disruption from the crackdown and the outcry from employers will revive immigration reform.

There are an estimated 12 million illegal immigrants in this country, about half of them employed. The administration will target with stepped-up raids businesses that traditionally employ large numbers of illegals, and the Homeland Security Department will work with the Social Security Administration to target the holders of fake Social Security numbers.

Some past raids have been shown to be ineffective and downright cruel to illegal immigrant families. The Star hopes the administration recognizes this and ensures humane protection policies are in place and observed by federal agents.

Whatever impact the crackdown has on a reform bill, it will test a key proposition advanced by backers of immigration reform: that illegal immigrants play a significant and useful role in the U.S. economy by taking jobs in agriculture, meatpacking, construction and the service industry that many U.S. citizens won't.

The Bush administration believes, and perhaps correctly, that when the jobs go begging after undocumented immigrants are forced out of them, the lawmakers and the public will want a second look at immigration reform.