Working In Plain Sight

[HARDCORE]

Working in plain sight

More companies hiring illegal employees as government enforcement drops sharply


By Marisa Taylor and Leonel Sanchez
STAFF WRITERS - San Diego - UNION TRIBUNE

January 11, 2004



Raul Palacios' co-worker told him what to do if immigration officers showed up at the San Diego County supermarket where he swept and mopped floors.

Escape while you can. Don't get arrested like the undocumented workers at those Wal-Mart stores.

But the two Mexicans, both illegal immigrants hired by a Vons cleaning contractor, had little reason to worry.

No major U.S. retailer has been targeted by immigration agents since October, when more than 300 illegal workers were arrested at Wal-Mart stores in 21 states.

In fact, the government rarely has cracked down on illegal hiring, even though as many as 12 million people are thought to be residing illegally in the United States.

Between 1992 and 2002, the number of illegal workers apprehended each year at work sites dropped from 8,027 to 1,254, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

The number of companies fined for hiring illegal workers also plummeted ? from 1,063 to just 13.

In San Diego County, only one owner, whose company hired workers for major hotels, has been prosecuted since 2000, and he was given probation. No business has been fined.

"It's the 'don't ask, don't tell' of illegal immigration," said Peter Larrabee, a former immigration officer who is now a San Diego lawyer representing businesses in immigration cases. "Everyone knows that illegal workers are here in the United States, but no one wants to do anything about it."

Despite high-profile examples such as the Wal-Mart raids and an earlier investigation of Tyson Foods, the government continues to send mixed signals about its immigration strategy.

Last week, President Bush unveiled an ambitious immigration proposal that would simultaneously strengthen border security and temporarily legalize most undocumented workers. Although details of the plan haven't been announced, the Wal-Mart workers who were arrested in October probably would have been eligible. So would Palacios and his friend.

The tug-of-war between enforcement and employment is nothing new.

Historically, little or nothing has been done to stop employers from hiring undocumented workers. Yet billions of dollars have been spent on fences, technology and personnel to keep people from illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border.

Last year, for instance, the Bush administration requested $711 million to stop illegal immigrants at the border and just $19.7 million to find those inside the country. The General Accounting Office estimates that at least 200,000 U.S. companies employ illegal workers.

"This is all consistent with our national ambivalence over how to treat undocumented workers," said Kevin Johnson, a civil rights and immigration law professor at the University of California Davis. "We need their labor. We want them to stay. At the same time, they're here illegally and they should be punished."


Obstacles
A sweeping immigration law passed in 1986 was supposed to resolve this contradiction.
The law allowed nearly 3 million illegal immigrants to become legal residents. It also made it a crime for employers to knowingly hire illegal immigrants and imposed fines of up to $10,000 per violation.

However, the government gave up on such sanctions, saying they were ineffective. One problem was that investigators had trouble proving employers knowingly hired illegal workers.

In one of the government's biggest failures on the issue, Tyson Foods and three of its managers were acquitted in March of conspiring to hire illegal immigrants to work at poultry processing plants. The jury said the government's four-year investigation didn't prove the company knew the workers were in the country illegally.

Businesses often blame such hiring mistakes on fake IDs, which can be bought easily in most big U.S. cities. Companies say they can't question job candidates too closely for fear of being accused of discrimination.

"Most employers want to do the right thing and hire legal workers, but there are so many people who produce real-looking fake documents," said Catherine Haight, a Los Angeles immigration attorney who represents companies. "It puts employers in a precarious position because if they pick them apart too much, they may be invalidating someone who has a right to work."

Companies also can claim they don't monitor their workers' legal status because they hire them through labor contractors, which are supposed to do the checking.

Jeff Passel, a researcher at the Urban Institute, a nonpartisan economic and social policy think tank, said the use of labor contractors boomed after the 1986 law made hiring illegal immigrants a punishable offense.

"From the retailers' point of view, it became a way to insulate themselves from the liability of hiring unauthorized workers," he said.

In earlier investigations of Wal-Mart in 1998 and 2001, for example, 13 of the company's cleaning contractors admitted hiring illegal workers, but Wal-Mart officials have denied any wrongdoing, saying they thought the contractors were checking workers' legal status.

With few penalties to deter them, employers nationwide have increasingly turned to illegal workers, especially in agriculture, meat-packing, construction, manufacturing and services. According to the Immigration Policy Center, a nonpartisan research organization in Washington, D.C., 500,000 immigrants have entered the country illegally each year since 1993.

About 20 percent of the nation's poorest-paying jobs are held by immigrants, Passel said, with more than 3 million of them working illegally. If the nation's immigration policy remains unchanged, experts predict that number will grow, given weak government oversight and the nation's hunger for cheap labor.

"The undocumented worker very desperately needs to work, and there are employers out there who will exploit these needs," said Jared Bernstein, senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute, a research group in Washington, D.C. "Any labor standard that we think folks should have ? time and a half, minimum wage, decent conditions ? those can be violated with no fear of retribution."


Janitors sue
When Raul Palacios arrived in San Diego two years ago, he was desperate enough to endure almost anything.
In his home state of Puebla, he made just $60 a month as a glass blower.

He was happy to get a job as a janitor in the United States to support his wife and five children.

Palacios, 35, has worked for three supermarket janitorial contractors.

The first contractor, Palacios said, didn't pay him after he worked 21 straight 11-hour shifts cleaning two stores. Palacios joined a class-action lawsuit with thousands of other California supermarket janitors against Vons, Ralphs, Albertsons and their labor contractors, seeking millions of dollars in back wages.

When the workers' immigration status was questioned, the federal judge ruled it was irrelevant.

The case is set to go to trial next month in Los Angeles, but the contractor has declared bankruptcy.

Palacios didn't fare any better with the next contractor he worked for at Vons, Los Angeles-based TBS Company, which vanished earlier this year without paying him and other janitors for two weeks of work.

This time, he turned to the Maintenance Cooperation Trust Fund for help. The fund, a cleaning industry watchdog group, filed claims for 72 janitors with the state's Industrial Relations Department, and in June, Vons voluntarily paid them $114,000 in back wages.

Palacios was then hired by a third contractor, Cerritos-based King Equipment Services. He said he worked the midnight shift at Vons for 15 days, got one day off, then began the cycle again. According to one of Palacios' recent pay stubs, he earned about $1,640 each month, before deductions for Social Security and workers' compensation. By rooming with other illegal immigrants, he managed to save enough to send his family $900 per month.

Palacios said none of the three contractors questioned his immigration status beyond asking for identification papers. The Social Security and green cards he produced, however, were false. He said he bought them for $160 from a labor recruiter soon after he crossed into the United States.

Vons did not return repeated phone calls seeking an interview.

Rodney Strague, co-owner of King Equipment, disputed Palacios' description of his work schedule. Strague said his employees work 13 consecutive days by choice, get two days off and receive overtime pay.

Strague said he has rejected several job applicants for using fake IDs.

"It has to look legitimate," the contractor said. "If it looks outrageously fraudulent, I'm not going to hire them."

Palacios seemingly no longer has to worry about his documents being checked. When The San Diego Union-Tribune called Palacios' apartment Tuesday, a roommate said he had suddenly gone home to Mexico.


Security risks
In the early 1990s, illegal immigrant workers had more reason to fear being detected. Border Patrol agents occasionally went on raids and picked up illegal workers, and more employers were fined for hiring them.
But by the end of the decade, immigration officials started cajoling businesses to comply with immigration laws rather than penalizing them. Instead of conducting surprise inspections and levying fines, agents started asking companies for permission to review employee records.

Joe Greene, a deputy assistant director of Homeland Security's Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Washington, D.C., said sanctions simply didn't work.

"We began asking ourselves some tough questions," Greene said. "The strategy didn't seem to be making a dent in changing the practices of employers. The same workers who fled during raids always seemed to return the next day."

Keeley of the Center for Immigration Studies said the government was willing to look the other way because the economy was booming. When agents arrested 21 illegal workers in Georgia's onion fields in 1998, for example, politicians complained and within days the raids stopped.

"The message in the 1990s was if you elude the Border Patrol you have a job waiting for you, because there was no reprisal for virtually any employer hiring illegal aliens in mass."

After the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the government's focus shifted to screening companies connected to national security, such as airports and military contractors. The preferred technique is to review those companies ? but only after asking for their cooperation.

The number of voluntary reviews in San Diego has risen from two companies in 2001 to 374 companies in 2003.

"I'm never going to say that we would ignore a mom-and-pop convenience store in San Diego," said Michael Turner, the special agent in charge of Immigration and Customs Enforcement in San Diego. "But this is all against the backdrop that we have up to 11 million undocumented immigrants in this country and it's our job to catch them all. Clearly you have to prioritize, and right now the emphasis is national security."

Companies that aren't a security risk are left to monitor themselves voluntarily by plugging workers' names and Social Security numbers into a computer database. They can notify authorities if they get a hit ? but that's not a requirement.

Critics say only about 2,500 of the nation's employers participate in the voluntary program. The system also can be unreliable because it uses immigration and Social Security information that can be incomplete or wrong.

Even if all employers were required to check the database, most immigration experts say the system would still be ineffective because birth certificates and other identification papers can be stolen or forged.

So far, proposals calling for national ID cards ? or for nationally standardized birth certificates and drivers' licenses ? have been rejected.

"We have the technology," said Larrabee, the former immigration officer. "But even after the terrorist attacks, the country may not be politically or philosophically ready."

The Bush administration's new immigration proposal doesn't mention national IDs or other standardized documents, or offer specific plans for more workplace enforcement. Instead, it promises yet again to strengthen security at the border.



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Marisa Taylor: marisa.taylor@uniontrib.com



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Sanchez: leonel.sanchez@uniontrib.com

[reeb]

HC,

The 12 million illegals here.

On CNN This mornign the unemployment numbers of the ones filed were 12.7 million USA citizens without work.

Do ya think we talk to Fox and have him send up the other .7 million to make it across the board and for get the math.??

enough.........

[HARDCORE]

reeb

Shh!!! you might give him ideas!!!!!!!

VERITAS

[frisco-kid]

last minute change of mind to give illegals CA drivers licenses, this proposal to temporarily legalize illegal aliens by Bush is a blatant panning for the votes of the Hispanic community in an election year. Personally, this flip-flop was what pushed me to vote for Arnold at the last minute. I'm not sure this is going to work much better for Bush, even among some Repubs and Hispanics. I'm not saying that the plan is a totally bad one, but it needs to be tweaked more towards detailed documentation and background checks of these people and less towards, once again, stopping the undesirables at the border. That's already proven to be about as efficient as screen doors on submarines. Also, don't be surprised if another amnesty is proposed. Another proven failure to stem the tide.

Here in Central CA the biggest threat to American jobs, in my opinion, is the OUT SOURCING of jobs. This has really taken it's toll on the High Technology industry of the Silicon Valley. The industry utilizes both practices of sending the jobs out of the country AND importing the cheaper labor into this country to perform the jobs.

I recently saw an interview with a Siemans [communications, among other things] employee that said that the company called all of the American citizens at the location together for a meeting. They were then told that they would be losing their jobs to imported workers from India. And then they were told that they would be given substantial severence bonuses if they would stay on to train their replacements! But, whatever their decision, they were losing their jobs.

Recently a McDonnell-Douglas spokesperson said in an interview talking about the practice of Out Sourcing, that a job was no longer an American's God-given right! Now, I'm not currently in the market for an airplane but if I were, this statement alone would make me boycott them. These are but a couple of examples. A list of companies that does this practice would read like a WHO'S WHO of Corporate America. From AT&T to Xerox.

This raises the question: What is our Government doing about this practice to protect American jobs? I don't think that it would be unreasonable for OUR Government to at least make any company that has any type of a Government contract, no matter how small, to justify this practice. Like proving that they were unable to fill these jobs with qualified American workers before giving them to foriegn workers. Or putting a hefty export tax on the raw materials or components sent out of the country to be manufactured or assembled somewhere else. And heftly taxed again by an import tax as they were brought back into the USA to be sold to it's citizens or used by it's Government. I don't pretend to know all of the intricacies of foreign trade. Are these stupid questions and naive expectations? I only know what seems FAIR. But then fairness and doing the right thing is about as scarce as lips on chickens in Corporate America these days.

[Gimpy]

But then fairness and doing the right thing is about as scarce as lips on chickens in Corporate America these days.

Ain't THAT the truth!

[reconeil]

In fairness to all large corporations in America, their CEOs and Board of Directors take no oaths to The People of America, and have no responsibilities other than making money for themselves, The Board and Shareholders. Naturally they must also pay salaries, collect taxes from same salaries, and pretty-much operate within governmental guidelines and restrictions.

So then,...if wanting to get on anyones case about America's Jobs being lost in great volume, one should go directly to the largest corporation in America and/or The Government and: "Guideline and restriction" maker. For quite some years our political oath takers have shown more concern for the welfare of foreign workers,...than they have for The American Worker and/or The Ones whose taxes insure "Their" high salaries and greatest of all pensions.

Hey,...maybe we should: "Outsource" a good portion of our politicos? Except for great savings for The People,...bet no one would even notice.

Neil

[frisco-kid]

Corporate America needs to be reminded that they are AMERICAN companies, and are given HUGE tax breaks by municiple, county, state, and federal governments, not to mention the cut rates that they receive from the various utility companies that they deal with, all in AMERICA . Maybe some of these tax breaks, etc. should be based on the number of AMERICAN employees.

[Boats]

My thoughts are a bit more towards the government side. I think if they get them registered two things will happen. 1. They get voters and 2. some will start paying taxes.

Plus the service work they do currently is most likely cash or paid under the table, and for less than min. wages. You find these people taking the jobs that really no one wants to do.

I do wish the bi-lingual situation was resolved we're beginning to look like Canada - English/French. Two standards are tough to deal with. Same with math issues - American vr's Metric.

The cost have to be tremendous to make two types in two different styles instead of just standardizing.

These are just my thoughts.

[HARDCORE]

Great thoughts Boats!

[Seascamp]

I?m going to go against the flow here a bit. I now work for one of the biggest and most successful American Corporations in the world, bar none. Given that, it is common practice to take commodity products offshore and then upgrade or replace the products of the affected plant to meet a new market need. It is also a practice to hire and train locally where we set up offshore; this includes all levels of management and supervision. To my knowledge there is not a policy or practice to hire replacement employees because of cost reasons, never seen or heard of it being done. Jobs go to the most qualified, no exceptions. Each involved geographical area sets wages, compensation and benefits according to local parity and equity. The only plants I know of in my region to be closed down were in Northern California. And then all employees were given a relocation option and the same businesses continued in other Western States.

There is a cruel reality in the USA and it?s the overall cost of an employee these days. It is not so much the wage package anymore as it is the benefit package. Be it an entry-level person or an executive, the cost is the same and it?s astronomical. Medical and dental insurance costs are off the charts and still climbing, almost vertically.
I?m talking about out of sight and these costs and similar costs are a principal driver in the make here or offshore decision as well as decisions about hiring qualified people that will work without a benefit package or with a severely limited one. Then there is product liability insurance that covers both an employee and the Corporation and that is astronomical and growing by leaps and bounds.

I snicker at the concept of usual corporate tax breaks being excessive. The tax number is 50% of profits, five zero, then the State, County, City, etc., get their paw out as well. All to often what is left for capital reinvestment, R&D, etc., is less than what would have been gained if the same investment had been put in a garden-variety bank. That is exactly when a change of State or Country is on the board and happening, over and over again. Or the owners/stock holders? just say screw it, sell to a deep pocket Corporation, or liquidate assets and call it a day. That is happening a decent pace as well.

So from my point of view I won?t say the goose that laid the golden eggs is dead but in places like California it's in ICU with a poor prognoses or goose has gone offshore or to a different State.

Scamp

As a P.S.
From the time I took off the Navy ball cap and put on the hard hat, I have never missed a day of employment, ever. As customers and employers Corporate America has been very good to me, very good indeed. And they still are, every day.