E-Verify is a voluntary, free internet program that allows employers to verify the work eligibility of new hires. Administered by the Department of Homeland Security, Citizenship and Immigration Services (DHS-USCIS), E-Verify compares information from an employee's Form I-9, Employment Eligibility Verification, to data from U.S. Department of Homeland Security and Social Security Administration records to confirm employment eligibility.
E-Verify is a voluntary, free federal internet program that allows employers to verify the work eligibility of new hires. Because E-Verify is successful in identifying illegal aliens seeking jobs, some local and national proponents of cheap foreign labor try to prevent its application by misrepresenting the program.
A common, unsubstantiated charge is that legally eligible workers are harmed by it because the program is so inaccurate.
Suzanne Bonamici, running for election to Oregon’s Congressional District 1, called E-Verify “notoriously unreliable,” in a candidate debate sponsored by the Portland League of Women Voters and the American Association of University Women, on Dec. 6, 2011.[1]
Here are some facts about E-Verify.
“Rosemary Jenks, the lawyer who heads up NumbersUSA's Capitol Hill Team, has repeatedly and publicly issued a challenge to the media and open-borders advocates to produce even one example of an American losing a job because the E-Verify system wrongly ordered it.
“If it turned out that of millions of transactions a year, there were 10 or 20 mistakes, we would be concerned but also find that to be an understandably tiny problem.
“But, to date, opponents have NOT BEEN ABLE TO FIND an example of even ONE AMERICAN who lost a job due to problems with E-Verify.”
The Biggest 2 Lies About E-Verify (arguments opponents use to keep hiring illegal aliens), by Roy Beck, Jan. 31, 2009.
E-Verify is regularly updated and enhanced to improve its accuracy and usability. For a description of E-Verify program improvements, see the E-Verify History and Milestones webpage.
In February 2012, E-Verify added a service called Self Check, which enables citizens to test their Social Security number in the E-Verify program to confirm accuracy. Thus anyone can make certain in advance that one’s standing as a legal worker is intact. Self Check is also available in Spanish.
In December 2011, E-Verify reached a new record for that time: it was in use at more than one million worksites.[2] As of June 2014, about half a million more worksites had been added.
Key Findings of the 2013 E-Verify User Survey
June 2014
More than 520,000 employers at over 1.5 million hiring sites nationwide are using E-Verify to help them confirm whether their newly hired employees are eligible to work in the United States. In 2013, the research firm Westat conducted an in-depth survey of nearly 3000 randomly sampled E-Verify employers to assess their satisfaction with the program, shed light on how they are using E-Verify, and suggest recommendation for further improvements. The following are [some] key findings from the survey.
Employer Confidence and Satisfaction with E-Verify
1. Most E-Verify employers believe that E-Verify is effective (92 percent) and perceive it as highly accurate (89 percent).
2. Overall, 97 percent of E-Verify employers agree that the system is user friendly. They continue to express high levels of satisfaction with E-Verify’s features and processes, including enrollment and start-up, system navigation, system reliability, program resources, and technical help.
3. Most E-Verify employers agree that the mandatory tutorial adequately prepared them to use E-Verify (93 percent), that the tutorial was easy to understand (91 percent), and that it answered all of their questions (87 percent).
4. Among employers who participate in E-Verify because of federal, state, or local government requirements, 70 percent say that they would be “likely” or “very likely” to continue with the program even if they were not required to do so.
[To view remainder of summary, click here.]
Linda Chavez in a column of Dec. 30. 2011,[3] asserted that the failure rate for identifying illegal workers under E-Verify is almost 50 percent, arguing this disqualifies the program for mandatory use. Other open-borders advocates also cite similar criticisms.
Jack Martin, FAIR Special Projects Director, answers the criticism succinctly:[4]
“It is clear that some illegal alien workers escape detection by the E-Verify system, but no one knows how many. The false confirmation percentage cited in the GAO [Government Accountability Office] report was an estimate by a government contractor. Since that GAO report was issued, Richard Stana, the GAO director for homeland security and justice, reported to Congress in February 2011, ‘USCIS has reduced the incidence of ... E-Verify's vulnerability to fraud.’ And further progress in reducing false confirmations will be made when E-Verify is made a national mandatory system for all employers because the proposed legislation requires SSA to report evidence of false use of SSNs.
“The irony in the claim of unreliability of the E-Verify system is that it is not being made as an argument for improving the system. It is cynically being made by defenders of illegal aliens in an effort to prevent E-Verify from being expanded nationwide. They are trying to preserve job opportunities for illegal workers.”
[1] http://blip.tv/community-media-videos/league-of-women-voters-oregon-dist-1-congressional-candidate-forum-5799173
[2] http://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/USCIS/Verification/E-Verify/E-Verify_Native_Documents/Everify%20Studies/Key-Findings_of_E-Verify_User_Survey_2013.pdf
[3] http://www.creators.com/opinion/linda-chavez/coulter-s-self-fulfilling-prophecy-11-12-30.html
[4] http://www.steinreport.com/archives/unreliability_of_e-verify.html
Here is a current list of E-verify employers in Oregon as of January 1, 2017.
Charges are made by opponents of E-Verify that the program cannot handle the large volume of work necessary for mandatory nationwide use. These charges are refuted in statements from some of the leading officials of the Department of Homeland Security’s Citizenship and Immigration Services, cited below.
1. Debunking the E-Verify Capacity Problem, by Stewart Baker, Assistant Secretary for Policy, Department of Homeland Security. May 21, 2008. (Second in a series on E-Verify issued in the DHS Leadership Journal)
"Based on a recent load testing, the system has the capacity to handle 240 million queries a year. That’s three to four times the number of people who are usually hired in a given year."
2. The following is quoted from Congressional testimony on June 10, 2008 by Jonathan R. Scharfen, Deputy Director, USCIS:
"The E-Verify program infrastructure is capable of handling the volume of queries that would be necessary for a nationwide mandatory employment verification system.
"DHS and SSA conducted cooperative end-to-end load testing of the Verification Information System (VIS), which is the database that supports E-Verify, in September of 2007. The results of the testing showed that E-Verify has the capacity to handle up to 60 million queries per year. This capacity is in line with the projected 60 million new hire queries per year that would result from mandatory E-Verify legislation applicable to all U.S. employers. DHS will continue to work with SSA to update the current pilot architecture to ensure that DHS and SSA can provide the most stable environment possible to the employer community and to create an independent environment for E-Verify queries, separate from SSA’s other processing needs."
3. Later Congressional testimony on Feb. 10, 2011 by Theresa Bertucci, Associate Director, Enterprise Services Directorate, USCIS, confirmed the capacity of the E-Verify program:
"Ensuring Future Capacity to Administer Increased Use of E-Verify.
"The E-Verify program is well-equipped to handle continued expansion. E-Verify currently has the capacity to receive at least 60 million electronic queries annually if all new hires were run through the E-Verify program. USCIS has invested in a dedicated information technology environment to transfer data from E-Verify to SSA to handle increased growth in query volume. To further help ensure continuous service in the future, USCIS expects to execute a service-level agreement with SSA in the near term. The service-level agreement will define the requirements for SSA to establish and maintain the capacity and availability of its system to support E-Verify."
4. E-Verify job-check system has room to grow, agency says, by Stephen Dinan, in The Washington Times, March 15, 2012.
" ‘We have the capacity currently to process far more queries than we currently handle. And so we can right now handle the expansion of E-Verify to additional states. But if it was mandated across the country, it would take us some time to ramp up for that exponentially greater volume,’ said Alejandro Mayorkas, director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, the agency that handles legal-immigration benefits.
"An aide on the Judiciary panel said Mr. Smith's legislation [H.R. 2885] phases in the checks, which would give E-Verify a chance to ramp up. It also gives the Homeland Security secretary a waiver power to delay implementation for six months.
"As for additional resources, the aide said, the administration could submit any new needs to the Appropriations Committee. …"