Do you REALLY want to stop illegal immigration?

There's one way you can slow illegal immigration to a trickle. And it doesn't take more border guards, or racial profiling, or ridiculous laws like the one in Arizona. Hell, it doesn't really take ANY new laws, although some well placed ones could do wonders.

Just start asking "papers please."

Not to people on the street. Not to "suspected illegals." Start asking it of the REAL source of the illegal immigration problem in America.

Start asking it to employers.

Federal law already requires employers to maintain records on all employees, most notably a form I-9 and corroborating forms to prove that their employees are eligible to work in this country legally. But no one ever seems to bother checking up on them most of the time.

If we were to start cracking down on companies who employ illegal aliens, demanding that THEY show their papers, then that might disincentivize their hiring practices. If we were to start shutting down businesses that hire large numbers of undocumented workers, we might just start putting a dent in their bottom line. And if we can get states and Congress to enact new, REAL reforms like making the hiring of more than a certain number of undocumented workers a felony punishable with fines upward of $1,000,000.00 and possible jail time for repeat offenders, then we MIGHT see the illegal employment pool dry up, and without jobs to work in then undocumented workers will be less likely to enter this country.

Of course, that's not going to happen because the employers who benefit the most from illegal workers are the ones who give the most in donations to politicians. They'd rather distract us from the real problem with racist distractions like the new law in Arizona.

did yesterday...

used to until they fixed the violations. There is nothing businesses fear more than a shut down because of the lost income. In the case of large companies like the agri businesses, it could mean a crop that rots in the fields because there is no one to pick them in time for market.

enforcement system in pretty much every aspect of life.

And that would take an Administration with the best interests of the people in mind.

Shutting down puts citizen employees out of a job.

another uncomfortable thought is that business is so marginal that it can't afford US workers. But sustains some US workers as it presently is.

To anyone who understands the economy is not zero sum game, some of these laws are putting Americans out of work in the name of taking in fewer aliens.

ABC News had a story several years ago about pressure being put on INS and ICE to man a border crossing the check trucks. INS did as instructed and the flow of workers (formerly hidden in trucks including well known corporations) trickled to almost nothing.

Problem solved right?


Nope. Growers didn't have anyone to pick the crops. The Western Growers Association lobbied their contacts to pressure the INS to de-man the border crossing.


Done.


The lettuce got picked.

If they would start fining employers $250k an illegal employee, the illegal immigration problem would disappear. Not only that, but those that are here would leave.

The only problem is that no one is willing to piss off campaign donors to do it.

It's cheaper to arrest the CEO of Tyson Foods than to arrest and deport the thousands of undocumented workers who he hired.

You arrest the bosses, the undocumented workers will leave, and they will do it on their own dime, instead of at taxpayer expense.

If you really want undocumented workers to leave, THAT is the way to do it.

As Thom Hartmann says, we don't have an illegal worker problem-- we have an illegal EMPLOYER problem.

I *love* that! It is so perfect, and TRUE!
:bounce:

And, had the INS (at the time) showed up, I'd have had to say that I didn't have evidence that the obviously illegal immigrants were here illegally. Did I know they were here illegally? Yes, at least in one case. Why? Because she told me. Of course, that was a year after I put her on the payroll.

They had documents. I couldn't tell if they were forged or shared by 20 other immigrants or what. Was that social security card forged? Was that a valid green card? Was the drivers license valid? I had no idea and no easy way to find out. If the INS had asked me before Maria confided in me, I'd have had to say that I didn't know any were here illegally. Suspicions aren't knowledge.

And if the document check showed the documents were forged, I'd still be off the hook. I hadn't knowingly hired an illegal immigrant.

If the INS showed up after Maria confided and I lied, they'd have no way of proving it unless Maria had confided with witnesses around. After all, they can't make me incriminate myself. Granted, many would like the government to be able to ignore the Constitution, but we still are a nation of laws and due process.

Then on top of that I had federal law to contend with: If I had just checked out the Latinos' documents I'd have had to check out the valley girl's documents, the 63-year-old white Californian's documents. Otherwise I'm just checking out the Latinos' documents because, well, they're Latinos. That's illegal. That's discrimination, and prima facie proof of racism--even if there's no racism involved.

Yeah, lots of excuses. Due process, burden of proof, presumption of innocence, civil liberties, Fifth Amendment, Civil Rights Act. All kinds of minor, trivial irritations that we should dispense with at once when they get in our way and prevent us from doing what we want. Bad when they do it, but holy and right and just and positively awesome when we do it, blessed as we are, our sins forgiven, by the sign of the sacred (D).

As I keep saying, we do have an illegal employer problem. And the Congress (D) (blessed be the glyph) promised to make it possible for employers to verify eligibility without running the risk of anti-discrimination claims, of getting rid of the "I didn't know" defense unless it was sanctioned and licensed by official government "we didn't know." That was in the mid-1980s. We're still waiting, although the e-check verification process did become available, for large employers, at least, fairly recently.

Of course, immigration and civil rights advocates fought against e-check implementation because the database used might contain errors. As if any other database the government put together would be pristine and error-free. Or as though the correction process wasn't both simple enough to handle the errors *and* redundant, the errors being those that the employee would eventually have to correct anyway, the sooner the better. And because it would disproportionately affect Latinos--as though any illegal immigration brake wouldn't disproportionately affect Latinos since Latinos are a disproportionate number of illegal immigrants (by that token, any amnesty program would be racist since it would have disparate impact).

the economy is the reason they are doing this now. They do not need the workers so they are getting rid of them. If the economy picks up they will come back in no problem. The companies want these people here and are paying off the right people to have them here. What this bill should do is make one realize the state of the economy. the last thing a nation can put up with during a recession is immigrants. The recession had immigration on the back burner. At least this will get a debate going. Mexico and Central America cannot handle these people either so it should be interesting. there will be no easy immigration for awhile. if you have been out of work 2 years and an undocumented immigrant has a job that is dangerous.

Depriving illegal, but otherwise law-abiding, aliens of their ability to earn a living and put food in the mouths of their U.S. citizen wives and kids, for example, is not something I particularly want to see happen. I'm OK with border enforcement, I suppose. But if stopping illegal immigration means hassling the aliens that aren't making any trouble here I'm basically opposed to that.

children. I wonder why they stopped the practice?

The kids can't sponsor a parent until they're adults. But there are impediments to the wife's sponsorship too. If the alien got caught trying to cross the border once, for example, and was deported, if he comes back he would be ineligible for the Green Card under Sec. 212(a)(9)(C) of the INA. There are other barriers as well. Sometimes it isn't easy for an alien to get a GC even if he has a supportive wife.

There are only so many green cards reserved for Guatemalans, for example.

With any surge in illegal immigration and applications for green cards, the demand overwhelms the supply.

They also have a process to go through to make sure that the marriages aren't sham or for-pay marriages.

Just saw Food Inc. on DVD: As always, the suits walk away unscathed!

Those workers come here and get screwed (along with the resident workforce) by employers with the tacit approval of our leaders, and then they act like the workers are the problem. It's always everyone's fault but the businesses' somehow.

how about we stop "legally" financially raping other countries so that their own resources can be used for the benefit of their own people. that's the reason people want to immigrate. Our corporatist government is to blame for "illegal" immigration.

the fundamental problem in american politics is that we adamantly avoid the fundamental problem.

immigrants in the US. Most of the suggestions here seem to deal with stopping the "effect"-build a better wall, back it up with guards who will shoot, jail the employers, don't give them health coverage, etc.

There's little of the attitude you see in Europe where neighboring countries figure that "we're all in this together. The prosperity of my neighbor is essential to my own long term prosperity. If my neighbor has problems and I ignore them, they will likely be visited upon me in some fashion in the future."

Here, if my neighbor is poor, I need to build a good wall to minimize the damage he does to my welfare. What causes them to be poor is not really my concern as long as my wall is strong enough. Perhaps it's a consequence of America's culture of personal independence rather than Europe's acquired knowledge that what happens to your neighbor (particularly if you helped cause it) will eventually be visited back upon you.

I am asserting that there is only one way to do that: addressing the fundamental cause of the problem. Anyone, repub/dem/ind, living in AZ or not, is going to have to face that fact sooner of later. If people have ideas such as you indicate, they're going to have to change them. Everything else is futile, like trying to cure cancer with Tylenol. Your reply confirms my idea that "we" are part of the problem, but not the cause. How we think about things, how we frame issues, matters.

The reason I posted, the reason I usually post, is to attempt to cut through the bullshit of the issue, to point out how the fundamental problem is being obscured by the imperialist noise machine, the disruptors and dividers. I always hope that someone will see the truth of my statement, spread the word, and act on it.


edited for spacey omissions

Illegal driving, such as speeding or DUI, scares me more. Illegal wars bother me more.

As for migrants, find a way to make them legal rather than these restrictive laws that cannot be enforced. People migrate. No prior migration would have stopped from making it "illegal" either. I don't suppose the Irish or other Europeans would have stayed home to starve if it had been "illegal."

http://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=efe39ec4-163f-4817-813a-2eab40928d72

In an effort to curtail deep declines in deportations, U.S. Immigration Customs and Enforcement (ICE) Chief John Morton has set new quotas for Office of Detention and Removal (DRO) agents. There has always been a push to outdo the previous year’s accomplishments—it is often how budgets are justified—and for the year ending September 30, 2010, deportations are on pace to reach 310,000, far below both last year’s total of 387,000 and the agency’s stated goal of 400,000. In addition, Morton and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano have signaled a retreat from earlier pledges to concentrate enforcement efforts on the most dangerous immigrants and those involved in criminal activity outside of their own illegal status, likely due to the increased costs and protracted deportation process associated with such criminals. Given the current administration’s policy against immigrant raids, ICE’s enforcement strategy will ramp up efforts to investigate employers.

The Obama administration has publicly, as well as privately, announced that it is more interested in investigating and fining employers for I-9 violations, I-9 policy errors and worker infractions rather than simply removing illegal aliens. In the last eight months, there have been thousands of audits of U.S. companies—some random, some aimed at certain industries and some for cause—aimed at garnering evidence regarding problems with the work authorization and/or immigration status of employees.

Focusing on large, employer audits and investigations rather than individual, home, street and factory raids condoned by the Bush administration, potential investigative strategies may include using data from E-Verify to locate multiple uses of identifying information or documentation, or auditing companies with significant numbers of Final Non-Confirmations (FNCs) of employees’ work eligibility.

This increase in audits, coupled with the hiring of thousands of “forensic auditors” by ICE to review documents and assess fines, only continues to support the position that every employer must have an I-9 policy in place, proper training and procedures to support that policy, and the ability to produce evidence of compliance within a short time. Companies should be wary of viewing a Notice of Inspection (NOI) as a mere administrative request. As a matter of fact, the recent trend has been to require that vast amounts of documentation be produced within three business days and extensions of that timeframe are regularly being denied. Ultimately, an employer receiving an NOI or facing an audit may want to seek legal counsel prior to producing requested information or materials in order to take steps to identify potential issues and reduce exposure and liability.

Double the minimum wage, fiercely enforce labor laws, especially worker safety and overtime laws, and there will be little reason to hire undocumented workers. The businesses that hire undocumented workers need to be put out of business not because they hire undocumented workers but because these jobs really SUCK. No human being should have to put up with crappy pay and abusive working conditions.