Obama Set to Gut E-Verify Final Rule, SSA No-Match Letter Regulations

From FAIR's Government Relations team,

FAIR has learned from its sources on Capitol Hill that the Obama Administration is set to take steps to gut two important federal provisions that seek to protect American Workers.

New Rule Will Allow Illegal Aliens to Work on Federal Contracts

On June 9, 2008, former President George W. Bush issued an executive order requiring federal contractors "to verify the employment eligibility of...all persons assigned by the contractor to perform work within the United States on the Federal contract." The Federal government proposed a rule to require "contractors and subcontractors to use E-Verify to confirm the employment eligibility of all existing employees who are directly engaged in the performance of work under the covered contract." [Emphasis Added.] The proposed rule required contractors to use E-Verify on existing hires - rather than only on new hires, as is the policy for employers enrolled in E-Verify who are not federal contractors - because it would be the most effective way to "ensure that the Federal Government does not indirectly exploit an illegal labor force." After allowing for several months of public comment, the government issued the final rule stating the E-Verify requirement would apply to most federal contracts issued on or after January 15, 2009.

In late December 2008, a coalition of special interest groups led by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce sued the federal government to prevent the rule from taking effect as scheduled. One of the many complaints lodged against the final rule by the coalition was that the requirement to verify existing employees was a violation of federal law. The Bush Administration caved to the special interests and delayed the rule's implementation. The Obama Administration has since delayed the implementation of the final rule three more times, and appears to be preparing to gut the rule all together.

According to FAIR's sources, the new Obama rule will GUT the requirement that federal contractors verify existing employees who are assigned to work on federal contracts. If this is the case, the Obama Administration will be giving job security to illegal aliens who work for federal contractors instead of freeing those jobs up for American workers, which is exactly what would have happened under the rule proposed by the Bush Administration. The new rule reflects a willingness of the Obama Administration to put the interests of special interest groups seeking to exploit cheap illegal alien labor over the interests of unemployed American citizens.

New Rule Will Turn Blind Eye to Illegal Aliens Who Commit Identity Theft

On August 15, 2007, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) published a final rule to provide a method for DHS to notify employers when there are "mismatches between names and social security numbers provided by their employees" and to instruct employers how to deal with these so-called "no-match" letters. Two weeks later, Big Labor, including the AFL-CIO, filed a lawsuit challenging this rule. On October 28, 2008, DHS issued a new rule addressing the subject of the litigation. This new rule went into effect that same day.

In the final rule, DHS stated that "while social security no-match letters do not, by themselves, conclusively establish that an employee is unauthorized, DHS's... interactions with employers that receive no-match letters have consistently shown that employers are also aware that an employee's appearance on a no-match letter may indicate the employee lacks work authorization." (Final Rule, Page 63845). Nevertheless, DHS also noted that one private study found that "most workers with unmatched SSNs are undocumented immigrants." (Id.).

The final rule established steps for employers and employees to follow to correct any legitimate discrepancies associated with no-matches (i.e., typographical errors) but did not address whether illegal aliens would eventually be fired after an employer followed this rule. Nevertheless, opponents of this rule argued that this rule would lead to employers terminating the employment of illegal aliens who are unable to correct a no-match discrepancy.

By gutting this rule, the Obama Administration would ensure that illegal aliens are allowed to continue in their jobs and would also be turning a blind eye to those illegal aliens who are committing felony identity theft by using the Social Security number of an American citizen or legal immigrant in order to work in that job!