If the documents reasonably appear to be genuine, can an employer delay employment of an individual just to make sure that documents are in fact genuine anyway? Can they only do this for workers of only certain ethnicities / national origins?
I don’t think the SS administration is legally allowed, much less able, to respond to such a request.
No, but there is a program, which Swift was a part of, which confirmed the validity of an SSN] submitted. However, based on the article on this in the Times yesterday, SSA cannot tell the company that the number is now being used for another job (or another five jobs) half a continent away, and there appears to be correlation to age and sex.
I can see the justification for the other job prohibition - a company could use this to see if an employee were moonlighting, and it is unlikely that SSNs of people leaving would be sent, so the data would be inaccurate. However, I can’t imagine any problems confirming a name.
BTW, the take on this in the Times is that INS is cracking down to prove to Republicans that they are serious, so that there is a better chance of Bush’s guest worker program passing.
Because for all the posturing and pontificating the government does about the bane of illegal immigration, their constituents – that is to say, large corporations like Swift, Wal-Mart, and Tyson Foods – like dirt-cheap illegal labor, and pay good chunks of cash to keep it this way. And all that talk about border fences and tougher laws merely makes it easier to keep the illegals in line.
Here’s ICE’s press release. What’s wrong with this picture?
They alleged a “massive identity theft scheme” and arrested 1,282 persons - and came up with 65 identity theft violations.
Looks like the operation was basically a fishing expedition for immigration violators.
The American Prospect thinks it’s also about union-busting and driving a wedge between the Democratic Party and both unions and Latinos. Their case is circumstantial, but at this late point it wouldn’t shock me in the least to find that the Bush Administration was using a government agency for nakedly political ends.
Even if it was a fishing expedition, I’d think that getting evidence for identity theft is a lot harder than for being in the country illegally. I wouldn’t bet the problem is limited to 65.
But this brings up another question. What’s on the W2? If the given SSN is, the wages for these people should show up for the person whose number it is, and the IRS would quickly start asking questions. Given that a name and employer is on a W2, it would be simple enough to track the thief.
If the wages are not reported to the same SSN given to prove that the person is legal, then there is a good case that the company knew or should know that the employees was undocumented. Thus Swift is guilty.
If you are referring to this part:
I think that is a major miscalculation on the part of the White House. Democrats were the only ones supporting the President’s comprehensive immigration bill, including the guest worker program. Why would the same Democrats suddenly care about looking tough on immigration in 2008, when they didn’t seem to care before the 2006 mid-term elections? If this makes anybody look tough on Latinos and unions, I’d say it would be the Republicans, who want to build fences, deport 12 million illegals and oppose “amnesty” at any cost.
Sir, I fear you are absolutely 100% correct.
Usually we can pretty much be assured that things won’t get too messed up. If one party really wants to do something the other party will stop or slow them down. The result is that things get screwed up 10% or 25% instead of 100%. In this immigration issue we have an unholiy alliance. The dems see votes, and the reps see cash and the possibility of losing fewer votes. I find this disgusting and would be thrilled if some people, starting with Bush, would get impeached over this. Not that there is any chance of that even being discussed.
I talked to my boss about this; he’s been practicing immigration law approximately as long as I’ve been alive. He agrees with me - employers are between a rock and a hard place on I-9 issues, even if they are trying to comply 100% (and admittedly, many employers don’t bother). If they have reason to suspect that documents submitted for I-9 purposes are forged or don’t relate to the person presenting them, their choices aren’t very palatable; they can let it slide, or they can risk having propective employees file discrimination complaints against them.
He said he would advise an employer in a situation like that to carefully explain to the employee the specific factual basis for being suspicious of a particular document, ask for an explanation, and if a reasonable explanation is forthcoming, give the employee a couple of days to provide additional documentation, on pain of termination. But if an employer is going to, for example, verify Social Security numbers, they’d better do it for ALL employees, not just brown ones or ones with accents or ones who appear to be foreign. Differential screening is asking for a lawsuit. And employers aren’t expected to be forensic document experts, nor should they be:
"QUESTIONS ABOUT GENUINENESS OF DOCUMENTS
Employers are not required to be document experts. In reviewing the genuineness of the documents presented by employees, employers are held to a reasonableness standard. Since no employer which is not participating in one of the employment verification pilots has access to receive confirmation of information contained in a document presented by an employee to demonstrate employment eligibility, it may happen that an employer will accept a document that is not in fact genuine – or is genuine but does not belong to the person who presented it. Such an employer will not be held responsible if the document reasonably appeared to be genuine or to relate to the person presenting it. An employer who receives a document that appears not to be genuine may request assistance from the nearest Immigration field office or contact the Office of Business Liaison.
DISCOVERING UNAUTHORIZED EMPLOYEES
It occasionally happens that an employer learns that an employee whose documentation appeared to be in order for Form I-9 purposes is not actually authorized to work. In such case, the employer should question the employee and provide another opportunity for review of proper Form I-9 documentation. If the employee is unable under such circumstances to provide satisfactory documentation, employment should be discontinued (alien employees who question the employer’s determination may be referred to an Immigration field office for assistance)."
There are literally scores of combinations of documents that meet the I-9 requirements, and I doubt there is a single person in the U.S. who has seen every possible format they can come in (how many of you have ever seen a Native American tribal document?). And for that matter, several types of documents which by definition can only be held by people who are U.S. citizens or permanent residents are not acceptable documentation of work authorization for I-9 purposes, which makes no damn sense.
So yes, it’s a one-page form, but that doesn’t mean it’s simple by any means.
Is it, or would it be, possible to outsource the entire process. In other words, every employee would automatically go through a screening process done by another company. This would add expense. But a company that feels it has a very low risk of employing an illegal alien could choose to do it in-house, but a company like Swift might choose to do it. I would thiink this is already being done. Is it?
To where? India? 
I really don’t how that is going to fix a problem. We haven’t even established that Swift didn’t do anything wrong. And if they were working for Swift, getting them workers, then they would be facing the same challenges and pressures that they would be. And they couldn’t discriminate based on ethnicity or national origin either.
You could go through a more thorough background check one like I did with the Feds. Fingerprints, 10 year history, references, etc. But why go to the expense (money and time) anyway for such a thorough, expensive background check for meat packing jobs? It doesn’t make any economic sense.
We haven’t even established that Swift did do anything wrong.
It’s all risk-reward. If a company like Swift realizes that they may (ahem) inadvertently be employing illegals in great numbers, and the penalties are severe, it just might make economic sense. It’ll come as no surprise to you that if I were in charge and they were guilty of wrongdoing, the cost of having those workers checked out as thoroughly as you were would be cheap in comparison.
My company screens everyone before the offer we make is official (it is indeed outsourced) - but we’re not hiring mostly minimum wage laborers. I have no idea what is screened for, but I doubt immigration status is high on the list.
That makes sense. Screen everyone, then make an offer, or not. I see that workers in a meat-packiing plant pose different problems, but it seems like the market is ripe for a company to sprout up and offer a better way of handling it. Maybe you can pay them toabsorb the financial risk if illegals ever get through. Of course, then they would be under huge pressure to get it right, because the risk to them would be huge. i don’t know. just an idea. It’s getting late.
If they are doing it inadvertently, then what penalty are they facing? And the number wasn’t that big either.
You missed the “ahem”. Naturally an investigation would have to result in outright wrongdoing or negligence. 1,200 hundred people seems small only compared to the number of illegals we know are here. It is an astounding number. There shouldn’t be 1,200 illegals here in total, never mind working for one company. A bit hyperbolic, yes. But you get the point.
Economic disaster would likely ensue without these people here. You lose 12,000,000 consumers and the economy will go to pot. The 1,200 amount is realtively small even for Swift’s total employee count. I don’t find either number particularly astounding.
Economic disaster? I don’t think so. These illegals represent about 3% of the population. So if they contributed to the economy (dollars spent) at the same rate as the other 97%, we’d lose that 3%. A hit, yes; disaster, no. But the effect would be less than that because much of the money they earn is not spent here, it is sent back to the home country. So given the fact that they are at the lower end of the earnings scale and that they send many of their dollars out of the economy, the number will be much lower than the 3%. Then we have the degree to which wages for legals at the lower end of the wage scale would rise. The supply of people available and williing to do those jobs will shrink, increasiing demand, and then wages. (As well as the attractiveness of those jobs.) Also, we have to take into account the amount that will not have to be laid out by the government in the areas of health and education and law enforcement, as illegals have a higher rate for incarceration than the general population. Finally, the reality is that there is no way to just snap your fingers and have the 12,000,000 disappear. Even with a serious effort it will take years. And as they leave, if we see (likely) that we cannot meet the demand internally, we can open the doors with a legal guest-worker program, mush like Canada has. I didn’t provide a lot of the actual numbers because I don’t feel like going through all that again. I know we’ve both been in more than one thread where those numbers have been provided, and for the purposes of this particular discussion I think that the broad strokes suffice.