Another amnesty?: New bill hobbles border states

History is threatening to re peat itself. Twenty-five years ago, Congress passed the Simpson-Mazzoli Act (better known among conservatives as the 1986 illegal-alien amnesty), which gave a path to citizenship to illegal aliens already here in exchange for prohibiting the hiring of illegal workers -- a provision that has been enforced only sporadically. It was a raw deal for conservatives.

On Tuesday, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-TX) introduced a bill (HR 2164) to require nationwide use of the E-Verify system, which checks a job applicant's citizenship and immigration status, via the Internet, to see if he or she is eligible to work.

While the Smith bill sounds good, in fact, it hobbles immigration enforcement. Negotiated with the pro-amnesty US Chamber of Commerce, the bill would establish a fairly toothless E-Verify requirement while defanging the only government bodies that are serious about enforcing immigration law -- the states.

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While the Smith bill sounds good, in fact, it hobbles immigration enforcement. Negotiated with the pro-amnesty US Chamber of Commerce, the bill would establish a fairly toothless E-Verify requirement while defanging the only government bodies that are serious about enforcing immigration law -- the states.

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The Supreme Court held that cooperative immigration enforcement, with the states and the federal government working together to restore the rule of law in the workplace, was permissible under current federal law. But Smith's bill (HR 2164) would change federal law so that the states can no longer take any actions against employers who knowingly hire unauthorized aliens.

State governments, not the federal government, shoulder the lion's share of the fiscal burden of illegal immigration. Illegal immigration costs the states some $80 billion a year, net, after any taxes paid by illegal aliens are considered. The net fiscal cost to the federal government is a quarter of that.

In effect, illegal immigration is the ultimate unfunded mandate. Now, the Smith bill threatens to tie the states' hands in addressing the problem.

The federal government has been unwilling to aggressively enforce immigration laws in the workplace, and this bill would be no exception. There is zero likelihood that the Obama administration will go after employers who fail to use E-Verify or who knowingly help their employees circumvent the system.

That's HR 2164.

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