[QUOTE=mhendo]
What would you charge Home Depot with? Allowing people to congregate on its own private property? Your assertion that HD is effectively paying these people “in kind” is ludicrous.
To my knowledge, Home Depot is not responsible for checking the immigration status of every individual who steps onto their property. If we follow your argument through, then Home Depot (and every other retailer, for that matter) should begin to require a US passport or a green card or a valid visitor’s visa as a condition of entry to the parking lot.
As for the INS going after Home Depot “the same way they go after businesses that hire illegals,” the fact is that the INS (now DHS) has traditionally done jack shit about businesses who hire illegals. Their standard practice is to drop in, sweep up all the illegals and ship them home, then give the business a mild slap on the wrist and move on. The business, of course, waits for the INS to leave, then turns around and hires another bunch of illegals.
If the government were as zealous about prosecuting businesses that hire illegals as it is about catching illegals, i’d have more sympathy for American immigration policies. As it is, however, they talk a tough game, while ensuring that the only people punished are the illegals themselves. They’ve gotten a little bit better over the past few years, prosecuting some business owners, but the enforcement of American immigration policies has generally been targetted almost exclusively at the supply side (fences; border patrols; roundups), and not at the demand side (the Americans who actually hire the illegals). This is rank hypocrisy, in my opinion, and is also a method of enforcement that ensures the problem will not go away.
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I’d charge them with aiding and abetting the enemy. 
Seriously, IANAL, but if people are congregating on their property outside the store AND they encourage that behavior by building facilities for shade, rain, etc AND it can be shown that those people are illegals, I’d tell my team of lawyers to find something to charge them with. I’d make it more of a pain for them to have the illegals there than to chase them off.
When the snipers killed those people in DC I was hoping that one of the relatives of the victims was going to sue the people in Washington (or was it Oregon) that broke from protocol and let him ago to attend a later court date instead of deporting him.
And I am 100% with you on going after employers. I think this is the single most effective thing that can be done to combat illegal immigration. I am for many, many more prosecutions, much higher fines, and much more jail time for more of the owners/managers. But this has to be done to enough businesses so other’s don’t say "fuck it, what are the odds they’ll come knocking on my door. I say we offer rewards for tips. And that the reward money be paid for by the offender.