|
(October 17, 2022, Washington, D.C.) — Today the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) submitted a public comment in response to a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) that seeks to significantly alter the physical document examination requirements associated with employment eligibility verification (Form I-9).
During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) instituted temporary flexibilities and waived the physical examination of employment and identification documentation for employers facing a sudden and near-total shift to a remote workforce. The Biden administration now seeks the authority, on a discretionary basis, to cement those flexibilities when certain conditions are met.
"Any action taken under the authority provided by this rule, if finalized, will be viewed as an attempt to ease the requirements of employment verification. While a welcome change for employers contending with large-scale remote workforces, it will be abused by bad actors who will hide behind a far easier good faith compliance defense," wrote Dan Stein, president of FAIR. "With the unprecedented numbers of illegal alien apprehensions and encounters along the southern border and the ever-growing crisis that we are presently witnessing, the demand for work is high, and any attempt to diminish verification will be routinely used by smugglers, traffickers, and unscrupulous employers. Any authority used to weaken document verification requirements will erode the intend of the underlying statute aimed at ensuring that only lawful aliens are eligible to work in the United States." . . .
|
