08/12/2007

News / .S. to get tough on immigration law enforcement. South Florida employers are bracing for new rules the Bush administration will announce Friday to toughen enforcement and stem illegal immigration

The Bush administration today will announce tougher enforcement of immigration laws, including fines for employers who hire undocumented workers, a new system to track the departure of foreigners and thousands more Border Patrol agents.

The initiative will include speeding up criminal background checks for immigrants seeking green cards and U.S. citizenship -- a long-standing problem for thousands of legal immigrants waiting for their papers.

But mostly the measures are meant to tighten border control and force companies to take record-checking of their employees' Social Security numbers more seriously. South Florida's construction, agriculture and hospitality industries are bracing for the new rules, which could carry hefty fines if they do not fire employees whose Social Security numbers don't match government records.

The new package of enforcement tools -- pushed as an alternative to failed immigration legislation -- will be unveiled today by Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez.

Although one South Florida immigration activist called the initiative ''a crackdown on nannies and landscapers,'' Chertoff, alluding to the new enforcement tactics in a speech in Boston on Wednesday, called it ``tool sharpening.''

''We shouldn't have a patchwork of laws. We should be doing a comprehensive federal solution, but we haven't got that thing done,'' Chertoff said. ``What I can tell you is we will certainly use every enforcement tool that we have, and every resource that we have available, to tackle the problem.''

The 25 measures outlined in the report -- some new and others that expand on current policies -- include boosting fines by 25 percent for employers who knowingly hire illegal workers. Current fines range from $250 to $10,000.

''I wish that the employer community had been consulted about some of these proposed regulations and had had more opportunity in shaping how they were rolled out and implemented,'' Laura Foote Reiff, co-chairwoman of the Business Immigration Group, told The Los Angeles Times. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services also will offer conferences for volunteers to help immigrants naturalize their status, and the Department of Education plans a free Internet program to help immigrants learn English.

The administration is also said to be looking for ways to bring in more temporary workers from abroad and has been quietly talking with immigration advocates on how best to do that, The Times reported.

The administration will streamline a temporary-worker program for seasonal workers, such as those who shell crabs or staff summer resorts. It also will extend the length of visas for highly skilled workers from Canada and Mexico from one year to three.

The H2A temporary-worker program for farmworkers also will be overhauled. The program is widely loathed by the agricultural industry for being heavily bureaucratic. Farmers nationwide face an estimated labor shortfall of 35 percent and estimated crop losses of $5 billion this year.

President Bush has pushed to balance the need for more foreign workers with border security, seeking to find a legal way for them to enter the country and free up agents to catch criminals at the border.

The plan calls for adding more border agents, using recommendations by Sen. Judd Gregg, R-N.H., during debate earlier this year. Gregg proposed increasing to 20,000 agents on the border from the current 12,000. Last month, the Senate passed a security bill that would pay for up to 23,000 agents.

Also, the Homeland Security Department will ask states to voluntarily share their driver's license photos and records with the department for use in an employment verification system -- a tactic meant to help employers detect fraud.

The measures are just another layer of enforcement that fails to deal with real problems, South Florida activists who work with undocumented immigrants told The Miami Herald.

''Is this what we really want, to crack down on landscapers and nannies? Seriously?'' asked Maria Rodriguez, director of the Florida Immigrant Coalition, a statewide organization. ``This is a continuing pattern of criminalizing poor people and scapegoating those who aren't strong enough to hold the line.''

''This would be fine if you were targeting terrorists and criminals. These are hardworking people,'' said Jose Lagos, president of Honduran Unity.

Border-control activists said tougher enforcement measures are long overdue.

''But, really, show me the heightened enforcement, then I'll believe it,'' said Mark Krikorian, executive director of Center for Immigration Studies, a Washington-based think tank that supports tighter controls.

This report was supplemented with material from The Associated Press and The Los Angeles Times.

BY LUISA YANEZ
lyanez@MiamiHerald.com
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation/story/198528.html

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