Having good relations with illegals has consequences
BY RONALD MORTENSEN • June 1, 2009

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The Utah Highway Patrol, Utah Attorney General and numerous other senior law enforcement officials throughout Utah are determined to maintain good relations with Utah's rapidly growing illegal alien community. This may be good for the illegal aliens, but it is bad for Utah citizens because illegal immigration and identity theft go hand-in-hand.



According to a senior Social Security Administration official, 75 percent of illegal aliens use fraudulent Social Security numbers to get jobs.

In 2008, 16 percent of all identity theft in Utah was employment related. This is an increase of 14 percent over 2007 and it reflects the growth in the state's illegal immigrant population.

When illegal aliens use fraudulent documents to get jobs, they commit major felonies, including document fraud, perjury on I-9 forms and identity theft. In spite of this, Utah's law enforcement leaders ignore these crimes to build trust in the illegal alien community. They ignore the fact that an estimated 50,000 Utah children are already victims of an epidemic of illegal alien-driven identity theft and that 1,626 employers were found to be paying salaries to the Social Security numbers of Utah children on public assistance under the age of 13.

They refuse to acknowledge that their failure to aggressively pursue and arrest illegal aliens using fake documents fuels employment related, child identity theft in Utah in spite of the fact that in Arizona an estimated one million children have their Social Security numbers being used mainly by illegal aliens for employment purposes.

Perhaps even worse, Utah's attorney general, police chiefs and other senior law enforcement officials refuse to even acknowledge the devastating consequences suffered by the victims of rampant, illegal alien driven, felony identity theft.

They ignore illegal aliens who continue to unlawfully hold jobs using Social Security numbers belonging to Americans at the same time American citizens doing the same jobs are being laid off.

They ignore the plight of American citizens who are denied unemployment insurance because an illegal alien is either already collecting unemployment benefits under the American's stolen Social Security number or because income earned by the illegal alien is credited to the American's stolen Social Security number, thereby making it appear that the unemployed citizen is still working.

They ignore the desperation felt by parents of Utah children who are denied badly needed, means-tested public benefits because the earnings of illegal aliens have been credited to their children's stolen Social Security numbers.

They ignore the plight of American citizens when the IRS goes after them for the payment of back taxes on income earned by illegal aliens using their stolen Social Security numbers.

They ignore the injustices that occur when American citizens are arrested or when they are denied jobs because the criminal records of illegal aliens using their stolen Social Security numbers are attached to their names.

They ignore the damage done to Americans who suffer potentially life-threatening consequences when their medical records are corrupted with the personal information of illegal aliens using their stolen Social Security numbers to obtain medical care.

This policy of ignoring massive illegal alien identity theft and the impact that it has on its victims is mean spirited and cruel. If this is the price that it takes to maintain good relations with the illegal alien community, then the price is too high and the policy must be changed immediately.

It is time for Utah's law enforcement community to focus on the citizens that they are sworn to serve and to protect rather than on making Utah a sanctuary state for illegal alien identity thieves.

Ronald Mortensen, Ph.D. is a retired Foreign Service officer. He is a co-founder of the Utah Coalition on Illegal Immigration.

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