Tuesday
Sep292009
Immigration Analysts Call For Employee Identity Verification
Tuesday, September 29, 2009 at 1:45PM
By Leah Valencia, University of New Mexico – Talk Radio News Service
Tuesday immigration policy researchers stated that illegal immigrants are responsible for the majority of identity theft crime and that little is being done by the Obama administration to stop them.
“What is striking to me... is how astonishingly uninterested in this crime the Internal Revenue Service and Social Security Administration is,” said Stewart Baker, the former Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary for Policy. “There is no inclination on the part of either of those institutions to enforce the rules.”
The remarks came during a panel discussion hosted by the Center for Immigration Studies at the National Press Club. Panelists urged employers to verify the identity and citizenship of it’s workers by using government systems such as E-Verify and Social Security Number Verification Services, explaining that 75 percent of working-age illegal aliens use fraudulent Social Security card to obtain employment.
“We are finding that foreign born individuals commit more varieties of identity frauds than Americans do,” CIS National Security Policy Director Janice Kephart said. “E-Verify is snuffing out counterfeiters relatively well.”
E-Verify, which is a voluntary online system operated by the DHS and SSA where employers can verify the identity of new hires by comparing information from an employment eligibility form to a database, has been a centerpiece in current immigration reform debates. Lawmakers have considered mandating all employers use E-Verify as opposed to the brute force of mass deportations.
However, when E-Verify was written into the Secure America Through Verification and Enforcement Act in 2007, the Congressional Budget Office estimated the system would have cost at least $12 billion over 10 years to implement. In 2005 the Government Accountability Office reported to Congress that E-Verify could not detect identity fraud if, “An unauthorized worker presents an employer with either valid identity documents belonging to another person, or reasonably well-made counterfeit documents containing valid information about another person.”
“If I were to take your name, your social security number and your date of birth... I could steal your identity through E-Verify and get through, It is not totally fool-proof,” Author of a CIS backgrounder Ronald Mortensen said.
E-Verify was scheduled to expire September 30, 2009 but on Monday Congress passed a Short-Term Funding Resolution that included a 31-day E-Verify extension.
“The difference between now and the future will be that the administration is behind it,” Kephart said. “They have now been convinced that it is a good program and they are willing to go forward with it.”
Tuesday immigration policy researchers stated that illegal immigrants are responsible for the majority of identity theft crime and that little is being done by the Obama administration to stop them.
“What is striking to me... is how astonishingly uninterested in this crime the Internal Revenue Service and Social Security Administration is,” said Stewart Baker, the former Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary for Policy. “There is no inclination on the part of either of those institutions to enforce the rules.”
The remarks came during a panel discussion hosted by the Center for Immigration Studies at the National Press Club. Panelists urged employers to verify the identity and citizenship of it’s workers by using government systems such as E-Verify and Social Security Number Verification Services, explaining that 75 percent of working-age illegal aliens use fraudulent Social Security card to obtain employment.
“We are finding that foreign born individuals commit more varieties of identity frauds than Americans do,” CIS National Security Policy Director Janice Kephart said. “E-Verify is snuffing out counterfeiters relatively well.”
E-Verify, which is a voluntary online system operated by the DHS and SSA where employers can verify the identity of new hires by comparing information from an employment eligibility form to a database, has been a centerpiece in current immigration reform debates. Lawmakers have considered mandating all employers use E-Verify as opposed to the brute force of mass deportations.
However, when E-Verify was written into the Secure America Through Verification and Enforcement Act in 2007, the Congressional Budget Office estimated the system would have cost at least $12 billion over 10 years to implement. In 2005 the Government Accountability Office reported to Congress that E-Verify could not detect identity fraud if, “An unauthorized worker presents an employer with either valid identity documents belonging to another person, or reasonably well-made counterfeit documents containing valid information about another person.”
“If I were to take your name, your social security number and your date of birth... I could steal your identity through E-Verify and get through, It is not totally fool-proof,” Author of a CIS backgrounder Ronald Mortensen said.
E-Verify was scheduled to expire September 30, 2009 but on Monday Congress passed a Short-Term Funding Resolution that included a 31-day E-Verify extension.
“The difference between now and the future will be that the administration is behind it,” Kephart said. “They have now been convinced that it is a good program and they are willing to go forward with it.”
Reader Comments (3)
Our government panders to the 20 to 30 plus (?) illegal immigrants allowing them free subsidies from taxpayers in the US. California--a Sanctuary State has one of the worst records that currently languish under the immense burden of near bankruptcy, instead of --ATTRACTING--ICE to illegal business operations. Why wouldn't certain legislators want health care for foreign labor, because they have an over abundance of illegal immigrant families to financially support? Our own government is so absorbed in protecting every other countries border? They remain unconcerned to our poor replica border fence that should have been a two-tier periphery, with border patrol surveillance lanes in between, as originally planned by Rep. Duncan Hunter. Every time a good enforcement plan is written, it’s methodically cut to pieces by pro-illegal worker politicians and open border fanatics. Though we spend billions on our armed forces in foreign lands, the rich countries in Europe just forward token troops and little money: while our nation is literary falling apart at the seams--or its rivets?
Any moment now I expect to hear of yet another collapsing ailing city bridge, deteriorating waterworks, the underground pipes and eroding highway. Our cities are already exhibiting inward decay, but years of neglect by the very people who’s supposed to protect us do nothing? I have reiterated watch "The Crumbling of America" on the History (International) channel in the next few weeks and learn? This is where your tax dollars should be going? We must not allow the Administration as in previous times keep sending our precious tax dollars to other countries. These politicians are deaf, dumb and intentionally blind to the rigors our industrial nation is going through. Not just Democrats, but the Republicans have had their sticky fingers in the bad apple--SPECIAL INTEREST--barrel, where money is plentiful. It's like they are intentionally trying to turn our magnificent country into a third world nation, while making other cheap labor countries, on an even par with our sovereign society as US wages tumble? Then Again the Council of Foreign Relations have been amplifying its agenda of free movement of cheap labor through North America for years?
Most of these other lands have been at each others throats for centuries, so why do we expect any metamorphism into something any different? Only change can come from within, not by our nation expending billions of dollars, American lives? We must build our own borders fences, tall and strong and meant to keep out drug dealers, criminal aliens, terrorists and the never ending tracks of illegal aliens. Our politician’s noses are involved in too much foreign policy, while our aging infrastructure implodes. Trillions of dollars are spirited out the country, while we gain little in return. Washington--MUST--start giving back to the jobless American worker by placing a 5 year moratorium on all immigration, even legal? The next politicians should deliver us from any new sinister path to citizenship or better referred to as BLANKET AMNESTY? Follow the "Rule of Law" and not twist it into something else for their own convenience, as it will come back to haunt them at the voting booth. Unless ACORN steps-in with another fed contract and handles sign-ups for the ballot box? In that case will still see absentee ballots for the deceased people, pets and anybody who has learned that you need no government picture ID to sign on to vote.
The 1986 immigration reform bill dismally failed last time and all we inherited was 5 million illegal immigrants that still keep on coming with their impoverished hands out. Anti-Illegal immigrant forces are growing in numbers to stop another travesty. They acknowledge it could end up costing billions, perhaps even trillions of dollars. Nationwide we have seen the advent of closing hospitals and emergency rooms that have been submerged everyday by swarms by penniless foreigners and their families. Yes! We need health care reform. Americans are dying, going bankrupt , falling under the spell of debt collectors. The special interest lobbyists are causing mass hysteria by lying to the people. Many insurance companies are under this bombardment in television, radio and mass media. Their Status quo wants no change to their profits or high flying CEO's making millions of dollars. on patients backs? I want health care reform, for the sake of my step daughter who died of Cancer, because the insurers said it was a pre-existing condition and they couldn't continue to insure her?
It has become an enigma--THAT THE EMPLOYERS WHO HIRE THEM-LEAVE THE MAJORITY OF SICK PEOPLE ON THE STEPS OF EMERGENCY ROOMS. SO THAT THEIR RESPONSIBILITY ENDS THERE? THEY DRIVE AWAY WITH A CLEAR CONSCIOUS? THEN IS LEFT FOR THE TAXPAYERS CHECK BOOK TO PAY THE BILL? THOSE EMPLOYERS SHOULD BE HUNTED DOWN AND HELD ACCOUNTABLE FOR EVERY CENT. We have already been warned by the census bureau of overpopulation in the not too distant future. WE now have a very unique deterrent called E-Verify, that is a part of the SAVE ACT and our lawmakers should stop procrastinating and make it permanent for every worker? Washington knows their walking on quicksand, if the try to under fund or spirit away E-Verify this time around? The corrupting influences from the special interest lobby, have failed to induce many lawmakers to table E-Verify. In our future it could have many other uses other than extracting unauthorized labor from the workplace. Once fully installed it could check state drivers license applicants, insurance, school and higher education registrations and hospital admittances.
Americans have been unknowingly paying taxes to underwrite subsidies for the illegal population for decades. This is the biggest draw to American jobs, because the employers who hire them are sentient that taxpayers will foot the bills for education, health food stamps, housing and other government benefit consignments that even as citizens are denied. Keep the phone calls coming at 202-224-3121 LOOK FOR ANSWERS AT NUMBERSUSA, JUDICIAL WATCH & OVERPOPULATION AT CAPSWEB? These websites can identity politicians who actually work for the American people and others whose immigration grading level is unsatisfactory to stay in office? Have you heard about any large ICE raids lately? ICE got the order to cease and desist from the motley Democratic leadership. They are also using their influence to either weaken the federal training program 287 G that gives local police federal right to hold for questioning suspicious individual’s immigration status and to rescind the no-match-letter capability in determining a person’s right to work?
It is critical in today’s market for those participating in online business to take action to protect themselves, their consumers and their investments from identity fraud with solid identity verification and authentication <a href="http://www.electronicverificationsystems.com/solutions/" rel="nofollow">solutions.
There are many ways to detect identify fraud. I hired a company - www.LegalEmployer.com - who did a seminar for my HR managers on how to detect fraud on I-9 forms. They are also a Designated Agent with the E-Verify system and run all of our new hires through. E-Verify may not be perfect, but it does help weed out many of the rotten apples. Companies need to really crack down on their I-9 Compliance plans and procedures. The government has provided some great tools - it is up to us as employers to do our part and not hire illegal workers. Less jobs for illegal workers, means less identity theft, more jobs for American workers, etc.