Posted on 12/14/2006 10:33:49 AM PST by APRPEH
Basic Pilot is a federal program and database designed to help employers like Swift & Co. verify that workers can legally be employed by screening for bogus identification such as counterfeit Social Security numbers and fake green cards.
But the program should be revamped or a new one created because it can't identify illegal immigrants who steal people's identities to secure U.S. jobs, immigration experts said Wednesday.
Michael Chertoff, Homeland Security secretary, urged Congress to take action.
Chertoff on Wednesday noted that federal law bars the Social Security Administration from notifying the Department of Homeland Security if Social Security numbers are being used by multiple people in multiple workplaces.
Lifting that legal obstacle would allow the agency "to more readily identify the kind of identity theft and identity fraud that we discovered in this case."
Chertoff was referring to Tuesday's raids at Swift meatpacking plants in Greeley and five other states, in which 1,282 people were arrested. Some allegedly had purchased or stolen names and Social Security numbers to get jobs with Swift.
Swift, one of the nation's largest meat processors, maintains that it followed all federal regulations for verifying the legal status of its workers. It uses Basic Pilot.
"Swift remains one of the very few employers to use the system," the company said in a statement Tuesday.
A fraction of eligible employers - about 8,600 out of 5.6 million companies nationally as of July - use Basic Pilot, which is optional. About 760 businesses in Colorado use the system.
The parent company of Dunkin' Donuts said this year it would require all franchisees to use Basic Pilot.
(Excerpt) Read more at denverpost.com ...
Basic Pilot was not designed to counter identity theft, said Sharon Rummery with the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, the federal agency in charge of the program that is part of Homeland Security.
The only thing this system is doing is protecting businesses with a "due diligence" defense and ignoring the ID theft problem entirely. Verifying a SSN is no longer sufficient to prove a right to legally hire a prospective employee.
My SSN has been passed around like a cheap whore, I have worked on both the left and right coast at the same time as dishwasher and a roofer.
This is a smokescreen.
Employers should have the FREEDOM OF SPEECH and ASSEMBLY described in the First Amendment. This would include the freedom to directly ask a prospective employee a direct question "Are you in the USA legally?" as well as "What is your zodiac sign" and any other relevant or irrelevant question.
Employers are prevented by law and threats from a dozen government agencies for doing so. It is discrimination just to ask the question. It is illegal to even allude to certain subjects.
We don't need to add more complexity to the rube goldberg regulations. What we need is more freedom for everyone to exercise their freedoms and to be then directly responsible for how they exercise those freedoms.
I realize this would put many bureaucrats out of work. Where else could they find a job where they would be able to lord it over others?
"Employers are prevented by law and threats from a dozen government agencies for doing so. It is discrimination just to ask the question. It is illegal to even allude to certain subjects."
I've heard this. but I don't believe it. I am an employer and I have never been coached by the feds as what I could or could not ask a prospective employee.
to reverse your question, what protection should the employer take to make sure the employee is legally able to be hired? at this time, enforcement of these employment laws is minimal and the costs of hiring illegals does not provide much dis-centive to business.
i agree with you, the employer should be able to inquire about any and every aspect about a potential employee. since you suggested it, {employers should be}directly responsible for how they exercise those freedoms, what or how is the responsibility to be measured? what are the consequences for a bad decision, and what is a bad decision? will businesses have any liability for hiring decisions or be given a blank check?
once the employer asks "Are you in the USA legally?" and the new hire provides the answer, what additional "responsibility" should there be when it turns out the employee was working under someone else's ID?
Thank Nixon's INS for the stupidity that law enforcement cannot ask the immigration status of a person.
Daley-1 fought it in cour and lost. Since the INS won at the district and circuit levels, but it was not appealed to the Supremes, it may only be "law" here in the Midwest. We'd have to check with a lawyer.
The free market should decide the consequences of most bad decisions.
There is a shortage of employees in the USA who are willing and able to work. The employer who does not hire the best workers he can is the loser, not the employee.
Isn't it amazing how companies like FedEx, UPS & DHL can track packages 24/7/365 anywhere in the world, but our gov't can't come up with a data base to track SS#'s. If these companies had been losing packages for 1 week, they'd be out of business, but the gov't still hasn't gotten their system to work after 9 years.
I went to a state emplyment office to apply for a job. Feeling a little naughty, I "accidently" mixed up a few digits in my number. Two minutes later I was called back to the receptionist to verify my SSN because the number I had given them matched with another worker in the U.S. Department of Labor database. They were even able to tell me he was working at a job in a town 100 miles away. They could have, but did not, give me his name and the name of the company.
Two minutes with 1970's technology. Do you suppose this couldn't be done with current technology? Or is it just a matter of not wanting to know?
Maybe some class action suits agains employers hiring illegals would get the government up to speed. Employers would then clamor for a better system.
Bingo.
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