Bush's Speech: Not The Employers Fault

[Sonicmedusa]

Someone please help me understand this.

Bush is saying that it is not the poor employers fault that they hire illegals and therefore we need these biometric ID cards to sort them all out. Uh huh.

So who’s fault is it, then?

Because unless things have changed since I last looked into it, the IRS and SSA know where illegals are employed and yet do not share this info with the INS or employers. Indeed, the IRS even issues US tax numbers to known illegals (who do not have the infamous “forged documents” ) and collect their tax dollars anyway. The SSA gets their piece of pie, too.

So why aren’t employers informed they have illegal employees? It CANNOT be because the Gov gives a damn about anyone's privacy, surely.

[flobee1]

1. So why aren’t employers informed they have illegal employees

A hunch tells me they DO know!
psssssst:check the salaries!


there are porbably a few workers employed that aren't "on the books"

[Oceansaway]

2. by faulting them he'd be

faulting the very gov. he claims fame to...

they enlist/hire tons and tons of illegals for Iraq...

[RedStateShame]

3. I think it's obvious

The all-knowing, all encompassing LIBERAL MEDIA is to blame!!!!!

:sarcasm:

[napi21]

4. That's the excuse some employers use. They can't tell that documents are

forged. Shrub's idea is to provide a form of ID that can't be forged.

I had this discussion on Du about a hour ago, and I said anything can be forged if someone tries hard enough. Some things take more $$ and more time, but certainly can be done!

The excuse from the employers is bogus too. Any employer can check with SS and make sure the SS# provided matches the name of the applicant. They just don't want to bother with that stuff.

[Igel]

27. I've heard that a few times.

It wasn't the case in the late '80s or late '90s: I had no way of confirming that a SSN and name matched--perhaps the law's been changed since '97 or '98. And it's still the case that the SSA can notify the employer of mismatches between names and numbers, and say they require an update. But that's the extent of it. They can't draw any conclusion, can notify no law enforcement agency (legally, at least), and they have no penalty to impose for non-compliance.

I was in charge of I-9 compliance for an NGO and a small business. No feedback from the SSA when documentation must have been forged. It looked good, to my eyes. When I was doing it, the excuse wasn't bogus. I haven't seen anybody saying the law's been changed. Then again, there were different kinds of social security cards, various kinds of drivers licenses and IDs, and it's not like I was an expert at spotting forgeries. I'd never seen a Calif. ID card before, or examined an Arizona driver's license in detail. Were they forged? Got me. SSA never told me squat, and when I called to ask, they were singularly unhelpful--privacy concerns, you know, or too busy, or they just knew the name and number didn't match--perhaps I left out the middle initial or transposed two numbers. Gotta give people the benefit of the doubt.

The requirement: obtain the documentation from the employee. No requirement to investigate them; if they look good, you have fulfilled the law and have deniability. If you don't *know* that brown-skinned person in front of you is illegal, the lawyers tell you not to assume they're illegally here. Racial discrimination.

And if I had complained, my nice dem oozing-with-sympathy-for-the-poor boss wouldn't have had much sympathy for me and my needs for a strange schedule to accommodate my course schedule. I'd have been complaining primarily based on skin color.

I only ever penalized one employee for not complying with the I-9 documentation requirements. I knew his mother and grandmother were born in Kansas, from her records--she was a junior genealogist, and many of her records were hard to read (and I could decipher them). My boss knew this guy's mother when she was pregnant with him in Oregon, and bounced the guy on his knee when he was a newborn, hired him to mow his grass, encouraged him to go to college. But the guy had moved a million times, the IRCA was just taking effect, and he had no idea where some of his documents were. The people I was fairly sure were here illegally ... they complied with the requirements perfectly.

Make the ID standard, make it damned hard to counterfeit, make the ID easy to verify with a national database, make it illegal to employ somebody whose documentation doesn't check out, and make it not just legal, but mandatory, for the SSA to turn over mismatches to DHS. Currently the IDs are diverse; they're frequently fairly easy to counterfeit; there's no way to prove they're fraudulent, since a SSA 'mismatch' proves virtually nothing and the information goes nowhere; and if they turn out to be fraudulent, so what--you've complied with the law.

[liberal N proud]

5. It is 100% the employers fault!

It is the responsibility of the employer to insure they are hiring legal citizens or documented workers.
Who was it that systematically closed meat processing plants in the early 80's? It sure as hell wasn't the employees or the Mexicans. It was the corporations, Tyson Foods, Iowa Beef Products (IBP), Wilson Foods. They closed facilities where people were making a living wage, only to re-open them a few months later with illegal labor they hauled into the area at less than half the wage the legal workers were making.

:mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:
:mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:
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Yes I am mad, Mad as HELL

[ShortnFiery]

6. And let us not blame the wealthy families who are sure to employ

at least one undocumented maid as well as perhaps, a gardener.

Poor poor Corporations and Rich People who can't stand to pay A LIVING WAGE!

THESE are the entities we should be pissed off with --->Corporations and the selfish Investor Classes. Plus the lion's share of the blame rests with the Ruling Class of Mexico who have made the conditions for them to "risk everything" to come to the USA.

Let's all unionize ALL these NOW LEGAL workers and force the uber-connected to pay a living wage. THEN I wonder how "fired up" people like * will be for continuing this.

[wakeme2008]

7. Bush have you heard of an I-9

it is the form all employers have you fill out with two forms of ID.

See it here

http://www.uscis.gov/graphics/formsfee/forms/files/i-9.pdf


I fill these out for every contract I do.

[murphymom]

11. Exactly!

But if you look closely at the I-9 form, you will notice that it is not required to be filed with ANY GOVERNMENT AGENCY! It just stays in the employer's files for 3 years or one year after the employee is terminated, whichever is longer. For all practical purposes, there is no accountability from the employer for verifying the eligibility of their employees to work.

[Igel]

29. And notice the great responsibility placed upon the employer.

My SSN card records nothing but my name and my SSN; many older varieties are absurdly easy to forge, the newer one's aren't all that hard. I can probably buy one for $50. Only an idiot would forge a document from column A--they all expire. I've never even seen one, and I'm 99.9% sure I've examined the documentation for illegal immigrants.

I can get a voter's registration card in Texas by filling out a form and signing it. I'm not supposed to be able to vote until I present slightly more documentation, but I have the card.

I now qualify for employment: I have a SS card that'll pass non-expert verification, and I have an authentic voter ID card, one ID from column B and from column C. If I challenge a brown-skinned Spanish-speaking immigrant's identity, I'd better be damned sure I challenge white English-speakers' identity. If I require additional documentation from the former, I by law have to require the same documentation from the latter.

I know my employer is required to see the documents. They don't have an easy way of verifying them; if the SSN and my name don't match, the SSA can't do anything, and the employer has no responsibility to double check them. They've satisfied the law. Doing more in a discriminatory way might violate the law.

They've recently started to crack down on how accessible birth records are, and that raised a ruckus in some quarters. But if I can get enough information about a person, I used to fairly easily be able to request a valid 'original copy' of a birth certificate--and *then* I could get a voter's registration card with that, and even vote if I wanted to. Voila--even better, I have two original documents, no forgeries.

The I-9 is a joke. In 1986 we knew the IRCA's requirements were a joke. The dem house and senate knew they were a joke. The repub president knew they were a joke. They designed them to be a joke.

[LostInAnomie]

8. Yeah, why blame the drug dealer!

It's not their fault the junkies come to them for drugs!

[Sonicmedusa]

13. Whoa!

Great analogy!

[Vinnie From Indy]

9. BushCo is using immigrants to lay the ground work for an internal security

apparatus. Bio-metric cards, detention camps and use of the military within the US cannot be initially focused on citizens. The outcry would be too great. Using immigrants will allow them to build up the infrastructure without as much protest.

[ShortnFiery]

12. Yeah, I caught one of "Fox and Friends" claiming

that having a bio-chip implanted is No Big Deal. ;) Why it's GRAND even ... sort of like (I kid you not he said the following shit!) ---> Having a bio-chip to be read IS LIKE have a string around your finger to never lose or forget important personal information. :wow: :shrug: :scared: :puke:

[Critters2]

22. When my vet asked if I wanted my late dog microchipped,

he nearly instantly apologized, and said he hoped I wasn't offended. "Offended?", said I, "why would I be offended?" Well, he explained, another "Christian" client of his went bollistic when he mentioned chipping, said it was the beginning of Anti-Christ's work of implanting "666" on his followers, or some such. I told him to go ahead and chip the beagle. "I'm pretty sure he's the Anti-Christ anyway". He chuckled and got out the chipping device.

Some people's children!!

[ShortnFiery]

23. LOL, yes I get ya

When they first started this micro-chipping your pet stuff in the mid 90s there was concern that if not implanted right, the chip could "migrate." However, if you have confidence in your Vet, it's a very good way to keep track of our beloved pets. ;)

But microchip my kids, husband and/or myself? HELL NO! We have to educate middle America. :hi:

[NoAmericanTaliban]

10. Welcome to DU - they are all talk & not action when it comes to

going after employers that hire illegals. There are laws on the books now that could be used to go after them, but the GOP doesn't want to go after their money base. Classic situation of selective enforcement. What ever happened to personnel responsibility - if you hire illegals you should go to jail, and what about being tough on crime - the repubs are tough on crime alright as long as they go after the folks that don't vote for them. If the existing laws were enforced & some of the employers actually went to jail this law breaking activity of hiring illegals would stop.

There excuse for the employers is that they cannot verify the IDs, but they can do it - the technology is there now - but the program is voluntary so that gives the employers a cop out.

Also, look at these numbers - heard on cspan the other day that there are over 20,000 border guards, but less then 150 officers going after the employers. They don't want to go after the employers.

[Sonicmedusa]

14. Exactly!

It is SO generous of the GOP to give the ever spiraling-downward working class someone to direct their wrath upon- those damn Mexicans who are stealing our jobs with their “forged documents“- and not the corps and business that are hiring them.

It was not lost to me that he just glossed over "holding the employers accountable" and gets right to the REAL subject, the "new identification cards"?

[Vinnie From Indy]

15. BushCo and corporate America want low wage workers

Another poster is exactly right when they observed that BushCo is using the immigrants as a scapegoat for all the millions of American out of work. HOLD THE EMPLOYERS ACCOUNTABLE!

[Sonicmedusa]

16. Yes!

Sure, the employers fill out I-9 forms and photocopy the required ID verifications, but they just sit on file. Nothing is done with that info.

Regardless of whether the employer knows he is employing illegals or not (and of COURSE they KNOW), the IRS knows if there are 400 people having taxes withheld for that same particular social security number. Apparently, nothing is done with that information either.

Where are the Men In Black who call the employer and say, "Hey, it looks like you may have an alien on your hands" and give them the option of unemploying them or getting smacked with a punishing fine? (Awww hell, fine ‘em anyway...They can afford it with all the money they have saved on labor!)

Employer accountability? There is no GOVERNMENT accountability!

They have huge data banks of OTHER information, why not a huge data bank of cross referenced I-9 info?

It is all too obvious that the Gov knows where the illegals are employed, and WHO is employing them. I really, really hope that Americans who are paying attention will figure out that if illegal aliens cannot find employment, they will not come. And going after the employers is far more cost effective then “launching the most technologically advanced border security initiative in American history” complete with motion sensors, infrared cameras, unmanned aerial vehicles, training thousands of new Border Patrol agents, biometric ID cards AND detention facilities. (Hmmm....I can just smell the cash cow for Halliburton et all.) Simply take their jobs away and punish the employers.

Unfortunately going after the Employers would hurt those rich people that Bushco has sworn fealty to.

I am not a religious person, but I am on my knees praying that American can see that this whole immigration plan is nothing more then an attempt to ensure cheap, indentured servitude for the wealthy corporations and a further attempt to militarize the US.

[Vinnie From Indy]

18. You can be sure all those censors and other high tech

gadgets will be made by all BushCo's friends at a cost of billions. The way they see it, they win all over the place. Low wage workers and another excuse to raid the treasury for their friends. The mafia looks like kids with a lemonade stand compared to BushCo.

[REACTIVATED IN CT]

21. You hit the nail right on the head, here.

<SNIP> It is all too obvious that the Gov knows where the illegals are employed, and WHO is employing them. I really, really hope that Americans who are paying attention will figure out that if illegal aliens cannot find employment, they will not come. And going after the employers is far more cost effective then “launching the most technologically advanced border security initiative in American history” complete with motion sensors, infrared cameras, unmanned aerial vehicles, training thousands of new Border Patrol agents, biometric ID cards AND detention facilities. (Hmmm....I can just smell the cash cow for Halliburton et all.) Simply take their jobs away and punish the employers <SNIP>

Just check out the DHS website for contracting opportunities. Another contract or 2 for Halliburton!

http://www.cbp.gov/xp/cgov/newsroom/news_releases/01200...

The National Guard will only be there temporarily - until the privatization is complete.

And welcome to DU !

[struggle4progress]

25. And BushCo smells another chance to push for a national ID card

[The Backlash Cometh]

17. How do they arrange for Social Security and FICA?

One wonders.

[union_maid]

19. How could they tell?

All those contractors who cruise shape-up lots every morning? Not a clue, I'm sure.

[warrens]

20. The companies know damn well who's illegal and who's not

They just couldn't survive without the illegals. So they have things set up where they can protest that they can't ask because it would be profiling. Meanwhile, they can do a full background check on YOU any damn time they want, including your financial records, legal history and even if you smoke or not.

Not one new thing for enforcement against Tyson et al. Not one. A lot of these companies ran to the south and non-union states to get rid of unionized labor, and now there's no one except illegals to keep their plants running. They, as a rule, brought it on themselves.

[raysr]

24. What's going to happen

is one of these cowboy guardsmen is going to kill a mexican national on the mexican side, then the shit will hit the fan. Remember Kent State. Some of these guys are just itching to "draw-down" on a real person.

[Supersedeas]

26. How many more excuses will he make for corporate 'Merika

[Aiptasia]

28. Bush is so corporate...

It's funny to watch him walk the middle line on this issue. The repukes have absconded with the Dems issue of secure borders because they need a new issue to prove they're not soft on terror for the coming elections, and Bush is being made to dance for his corporate masters by saying lunatic things like this.

Dance monkey boy... dance!

[Why Syzygy]

30. It isn't just low wages is it?

What they are really doing is avoiding paying taxes for these people. They get no ss or fica.