I-9 Audits on The Rise, Fines to Increase

As part of its immigration enforcement strategy, the Obama Administration has announced that it would focus on employers who hire undocumented workers.  In July, over 650 employers were told that they were being audited for potential immigration violations, and apparently many more will be audited in the weeks and months to come.

“You are going to see audits regularly and on a larger scale,” said John Morton, the new chief of U.S. Immigration & Customs Enforcement to the Wall Street Journal.  Apparently, civil fines could exceed $800 per employee.  Yet this increased focus on employer compliance does nothing to address the fact that certain industries, namely, agriculture, construction, as well as others, depend heavily on immigrant labor.

In addition, despite the Obama Administration’s stated goal of going after ‘bad actor’ employers, the New York Times reported recently that immigration related prosecutions of undocumented immigrants (rather than the employers who hire them) were up significantly since Obama took office.

What we need in this country is not more enforcement, but sensible reform that addresses our economic need as a nation.  We must legalize the status of the estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants living in the shadows who have a critical role to play in the U.S.’s economic recovery.  President Obama and Janet Napolitano thus far have only paid lip service to the need for reform.  What we need from them now is leadership and action.

Tags: audit, I-9, immigration, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, immigration enforcement, Obama
Posted in Employment Verification | Read More »