I could be wrong, but I don’t think those two are on the side of the political spectrum that you seem to think that they are.
Buying large quantities of sudafed doesn’t necessarily mean you’re gonna make meth, but it’s a first step and so the govt regulates it. A federal agent being allowed into a place of business doesn’t necessarily expose the privacy of the workers but it is a first step so the state of CA is trying to regulate it.
mc
Not just CA. The American Bar Assoc says (my emphasis):
intrusion on seclusion
One who intentionally intrudes, physically or otherwise, upon the solitude or seclusion of another or his private affairs or concerns, is subject to liability to the other for invasion of his privacy, if the intrusion would be highly offensive to a reasonable person.
mc
Enforcing the border is not inherently racist. But any law, including those against spitting on the sidewalk, is subject to enforcement in a racist manner. See the difference?
Sincerely, thank you. That was an interesting post. Do you know if there have been any successful “intrusion on seclusion” cases made against employers?
No, I don’t have any specific examples. But a 1999 CA Supreme Court casehad this to say:
This specific case was about being videotaped in a business setting by an outside party, but I think the sentiment stll applies. Whether or not you have a right to privacy from your employer while in the workplace does not negate your privacy to outsiders.
mc
Gotcha. It would seem that this would be somewhere in between the extremes:
employer wants to look through your computer (probably OK, I think)
employer invites ICE agent in to review hiring documents in office, or chat with employees who are willing (probably OK, but more of a gray area than the above?)
random passerby off the street wants to peruse the contents of your filing cabinet (not OK)
Okay, but it is racists that support the building of a multi, multi billion dollar boondoggle that won’t do a damn thing but waste money and create serious environmental problems. There are many, many better ways to solve the ‘problem’ or use the money.
The problem is that on the list of things Democrats will accept grudgingly, they’ll take the wall precisely because it’s ineffective. E-verify is what they’ll really go to the mat to oppose, because that would work.
Ravenman isn’t a Republican, hence I said he’d make a good one instead.
John Mace, if he isn’t a Republican, sure as hell should be based on his argumentation.
Sure. In other words, there’s no such thing as states’ rights. I just imagined that little Amendment at the end of the Bill of Rights. Move along, you don’t impress me.
It’s been around since 1997. If it was going to work, surely it’s been given enough time.
How about this? A national ID card. Strict liability on hiring undocumented workers. That should take care of the “problem”.
Of course, there are consequences.
140 million dollars worth of crops rotted in the fields.
And when you ignore history, it repeats itself.
E-verify is only mandatory in one state for all employers: Arizona. Where it has reduced the illegal population substantially.
Now as for labor shortages, if the law is a problem, the law needs to be changed. Ignoring the law because the law is inconvenient is something we really should be done with by now. It’s the 21st century, it’s time to grow up.
Except isn’t there already a visa that allows farms to hire and bring into the country temporary agricultural laborers? It seems less like these GA farmers have no choice but to employ illegal immigrants, and more that they’d rather hire illegal immigrants than hire temporary agricultural workers and comply with health, safety, and wage standards.
That is almost certainly true.
I couldn’t give you a specific law, to be honest, without spending more time than I care to pursuing legal code, and IANAL. Just as I couldn’t give you the specific law that prohibits stealing wages from employees, I know I’m not supposed to do that.
But, I am told by my lawyer, my payroll company, and all that that the information in my personnel files, like SSN#'s, addresses, phone numbers, work history, insurance documents, information about their family, bank account and routing numbers for direct deposit, and stuff like that is NOT to be shared with the public.
This information could be very damaging if it gets into the wrong hands.
If someone came in and asked for that info from me, I would ask them what authorization they have to access that information.
This protects on a few levels. First, if I am not here one day, and ICE decides to come in and talk to my co-manager, and that manager is pressured to let them in and access to the records, then me, as the owner, has not given consent, I have not given voluntary access to records, but he, as a manager would have access, and ability to give them to them. They get “voluntary access”, even though I, the owner, did not consent.
Also, many people may not know the law. They may not know that you have the option to decline the voluntary search of your business, just as cops don’t tell you that you can decline the vlulatry search of your vehicle. If ICE agents are getting access to search businesses because the owner or manager on duty did not know they had an option to decline, then I see that as a problem.
Finally you are giving them access to personal information of your employees. Both in the files and in the workplace. Now, employees can keep no secrets from employers (while on the clock and on the premises), but employers are expected to avoid revealing personal information to 3rd parties.
That breaks down when you realize that it is not your own privacy that it being revealed, but others.
A better analogy would be asking employers to require that their employees use the body scan, rather than the metal detectors.
This analogy would be closer if the FBI could ask the homeowner’s boss for permission to enter the employee’s house.
I think that that last paragraph is trying to make the situation sound much simpler than it actually is. It is not just you and your privacy that is being considered, it is that you have power over other people’s privacy, and you are voluntarily offering that.
The second one is what is going from a grey area to being illegal, if this were to pass. How about in the case where the ICE agent comes in, asks for this information, won’t really take “no” for an answer, doesn’t tell you that “no” is a legal answer, and gets access to the information due to bullying and misrepresentation?
If that were the case, they probably would have done that rather than let their crops rot in the fields.
AB450 already passed, it’s not just a hypothetical. It’s the law in CA, as of 1/1/2018. That was the whole point of the AG’s press conference.
I don’t follow. Are you asking me if I think the employer should be fined by the state of California for failing to assert his rights? Of course not!
You are correct, for some reason I was thinking that it still needed a final hurdle to cross first. Not the case, my bad.
No, I was just pointing out that many employers may not know that cooperation with ICE agents is voluntary, and so may comply with their requests, not through voluntary consent, but through believing they have no choice.
If you comply with a request because you don’t believe you have the right to decline that request, it’s not really voluntary.
That person would be acting as your agent with respect to being able to grant access. If they are not authorized to do so, then they would know it and communicate it. Implied agency is a real thing. That comes with the territory of hiring a manager to work for you.
Move away from the search aspect for a moment because there are two prongs to AB450. The first is voluntary access to employee records, which. The second is voluntary access to non public areas. The second is my primary focus. That doesn’t implicate search of any personal information. In any other context of search, the voluntary nature of consent renders it reasonable. But here the state intercedes and says people are not able to consent.
There is no expectation of privacy in the majority of non-public business spaces. Sure, bathrooms, closed door meetings, etc. would have an expectation of privacy. But the open bullpen style office of the manager? That is prohibited in AB450 and it’s certainly not private for any sense of the word private.
They should, and I would hope that a manager that I hire would be up on all applicable laws, but to be quite honest, if ICE came in here a couple weeks ago, before I heard all the hullabaloo about California’s law, I don’t know that I would have known that I have the right to not share that info.
As far as people actually knowing the law and such, when I was a Wendy’s manager, there was a big issue because one of the other managers gave out employee numbers and addresses to a customer who called and asked, then the customer proceeded to harass those employees.
There is also the possibility of managers who have a dislike for certain employees, whether it be racial or personal, and they “turn them over” to ICE just for the hope of getting them harassed, even if they are eligible workers. Yes, people can be that petty.
I am not sure what benefit that ICE gets from getting access to non-public areas. The only thing I can think of is that way they can look at your employees, and make judgements based on their appearance as to who may be a suspected undocumented worker.
There most certainly is an expectation of privacy in non-public spaces. Not between my employees to me, sure, but to the public, absolutely. I put walls and doors and “staff only” signs up for a reason. It is expected that those areas are to be used and viewed by staff only.