Thread: Wilson: E-Verify determines eligibility

Wilson: E-Verify determines eligibility
news-leader.com
12:00 AM, Aug. 20, 2011
By Jerry Wilson

(Springfield, MO.)

(Re: "E-Verify proposal duplicates efforts," Aug. 17, News-Leader)

Interesting isn't it? A Kansas City lawyer commenting on Springfield city politics. Wonder why? Tony Weigel is an immigration attorney with the American Immigration Lawyers Association. He makes a living off of immigrants and immigration litigation.

The purpose of E-Verify is to confirm a person's eligibility to work in the U.S. - not to determine their immigration status. Although it's currently unlawful for employers to hire illegal aliens, there is a huge loophole in the process. All job applicants are required to fill out an Employment Eligibility Verification (I-9) form which requires them to provide two forms of facially valid identification, that is documentation that appears valid. The key term here is "facially valid." Unscrupulous employers who wish to hire illegal aliens simply look at the stolen Social Security card or other false document presented by the job applicant and say: "Not my job to determine the validity of the document. You're hired!" The I-9 form goes into a file and, unless audited by Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE), is never seen again.

This "facially valid" loophole has spawned a huge black market in forged documents. In some large cities, sheets of blank Social Security card forms are available on the streets along with forged driver's licenses and other documents.

Weigel's assertion that thousands of employers have been audited since 2009 rings hollow in the face of the estimated 12 to 20 million illegal aliens currently present in the United States. They are here to work and presumably all have jobs and employers. Thousands of audits mean little when violations are in the millions.

The United States government has failed in its responsibility to the American people with respect to border control and interior immigration enforcement. In some cases, fines levied by the federal government against employers have been reduced to 10 cents on the dollar. In his book "When Knights Wore Shining Armor," Paul Nicholas Weyland, a former Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent, writes: "Final orders on fines for employers were almost always reduced significantly from the original recommended assessment. This resulted in more expectations by the employer of mitigation rather than severe consequences exacted against the business." Those expectations form a solid basis for attorneys such as Weigel to earn a comfortable living.

Enforcement at the state level is not much better. The Missouri Attorney General's Division of Civil, Disability and Workers' Rights which handles illegal immigration matters instructs citizens filing complaints against employers who hire illegal aliens to "obtain the name of the illegal alien" and "have the form notarized." They further admit that they are not staffed to investigate such cases.

E-Verify is not perfect. But, it's still the best tool we have to fight illegal immigration. When the unscrupulous employers who hire and abuse illegal aliens are stopped, the job "magnet" will cease functioning and illegal aliens will self-deport - leaving jobs for United States citizens and legal immigrants.

Jerry Wilson is with Ozarks Minutemen. He lives in Ozark.

http://www.news-leader.com/article/2011 ... ligibility

Here's the article referenced:

Weigel: Minutemen's E-Verify proposal duplicates efforts
.news-leader.com
12:00 AM, Aug. 17, 2011

Springfield's leaders have a difficult task in sorting through the confusion drummed up by the Ozarks Minutemen's deficient E-Verify proposal.

The Minutemen allege a conspiracy between employers and the government to permit employers to knowingly break the law. As an attorney that deals with employer compliance issues every day, I know that the basic I-9 verification system isn't perfect. President Reagan approved of the system as the "law of the land" in 1986 when pen and paper were more common than keyboards. An employer following the process without knowingly hiring or employing an unauthorized worker has a good faith defense against liability. Since 2009, thousands of employers have been audited, resulting in record amounts of fines and criminal prosecutions. If there is a conspiracy, it isn't a very good one.

The allegation by the Minutemen of confusion in the basic verification system may cause even more confusion for employers if the city must adopt the group's E-Verify proposal, which is riddled with problems. Congress clearly prohibited nonfederal monetary fines for knowingly employing unauthorized workers, yet their proposal includes them. In 2008, the Missouri legislature required those contracting with or receiving a grant from city governments of over $5,000 to use E-Verify; their proposal curiously includes a requirement triggered at $10,000. The state of Missouri has a complaint, investigation and sanction process to police employers' actions regarding employing unauthorized workers, yet no mention is made of that process or explain why Springfield must, out of necessity, duplicate it. Where is the true source of confusion?

After sorting through the rhetoric, the Minutemen seem to have a mistaken belief that mandated use of E-Verify will remove doubt and reduce employment of unauthorized workers. Official reports have shown that E-Verify remains challenged after 15 years and millions of dollars of taxpayer funds. A 2009 report by Westat [a research analysis firm] stated that, "due to its inability to detect identity fraud, E-Verify remains unable to identify approximately half of workers without employment authorization." In December 2010, the Government Accountability Office reported to Congress that E-Verify was still vulnerable to identity fraud.

Furthermore, E-Verify use, administration and oversight can be quite difficult because of the unwieldy combination of manual and disparately automated processes. It is not "free and easy." If it were, how does one explain these E-Verify users' responses to the government's October 2010 Customer Satisfaction Survey:

"The system was too cumbersome so never used."

"Getting I-9 documents to HQ to E-Verify in 3 days is costly and problematic."

"Adds another administrative task to a very limited administrative workforce."

"As a small business owner, it is very cumbersome to use. It requires too much of my very limited amount of time."

Springfield's leaders should objectively review the E-Verify proposal, the puzzling set of mandates it places on local employers in a difficult economy, and reject it. If concerned citizens have legitimate complaints about employers, the federal and state governments already have systems in place. Duplicating those efforts at the city level simply makes no sense.

Tony Weigel is an attorney in Grain Valley.

http://www.news-leader.com/article/2011 ... y=nav|head

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