E-Verify

Skewed perspective doesn't tell the whole story

It seems that reporter April Ehrlich might be a bit off center in Worker shortage coincides with immigration decline in her article published in the Argus Observer.

First of all, and not mentioned in the article is that Oregon law that makes it illegal for anyone under the age of 16 to work in the fields like many of us remember doing.  We worked to earn money for school clothes, rides at the State Fair or saving for college.  It was hot, dirty and most important, a valuable life lesson that I still treasure.

The reporter states that nationwide only 26% of ag workers are illegal aliens.  That means that the remainder are US citizens or approved VISA workers who are willing to do the work.

Perhaps even more disturbing is the false wailing that illegal alien laborers only take the jobs Americans won't do - like picking our fruit and vegetables or working in the fields.  The fact is, numerous studies show that less than 5% of laborers in the US illegally, are actually working in the fields.  They, like most workers, want better jobs and move easily on to employment in construction, drywall, hotels and restaurants etc., pushing American workers and legal immigrants out of those very jobs.

The successful acquisition of employees can be described quite simply. 

Adequate, competitive wages for the work being done, safe, decent working conditions, attractive benefits and, as most industrialized nations do, mechanize when possible to streamline and reduce the tedious, dirty jobs often associated with farm or factory work.

The alternative, which is practiced by many seeking to avoid the above, is to hire illegal labor.  The fact is that it's against Federal Law to hire workers that are in the country illegally. There are VISA's available for ag labor, if only employers would do the paper work and be responsible.  But, that's too much work and expense, apparently, when they can more easily hire illegal workers.  After all, there are no real consequences for hiring illegal aliens - right?

Instead, those working here illegally are more easily cheated and abused as employees.  Those working here illegally are often being paid under the table, or using a fake or stolen ID to get a job.  Employers know they are hiring illegal workers, they know they are breaking the law and they know that it's likely an illegal alien worker won't complain about long hours, no breaks, unsafe working conditions or worse.

What kind of business model is this for the United States?  We aren't some 3rd world country taking advantage of the poor with no other options - or, are we?

Why don't we have a real conversation about what needs to be done to make Oregon's farmers more competitive in world markets in a way that does not involve encouraging more illegal aliens to come here for those jobs.  Why don't we invest in research to improve mechanization to make our farmers more competitive?  I think we're smart enough to do that - don't you? Read more about Skewed perspective doesn't tell the whole story

E-Verify may have prevented this tragedy

It seems that every day we hear of horrific tragedies perpetrated by illegal aliens.  This tragedy, however, just might have been prevented if the old guy would have insisted upon hiring only workers that have been E-Verified by their employer and have the legal right to work in the United States.

It's fair, it's reasonable and it's smart to inquire of any business that you intend to have working in or on your property, if their employees have been verified for employment in the United States using the FREE Federal E-Verify program.

If the business doesn't use E-Verify, or suggests they "know" the guys they are hiring, I would urge you to take your business elsewhere.  In Oregon alone, there are nearly 3,500 businesses that want to be certain they are hiring only those that have the legal right to work in the US., not just hire the cheapest labor they can find.

Who knows if this horrific tragedy could have been prevented, but, it might have been!

Protect yourself, protect your family, protect your property - insist on E-Verify.
  Read more about E-Verify may have prevented this tragedy

OFIR meeting this Sat., May 7 at 2:00pm

Alert date: 
May 6, 2016
Alert body: 

OFIR is proud to invite you to our next OFIR membership meeting Saturday, May 7th at 2:00pm at the Best Western Mill Creek Inn across from Costco in Salem, OR.

Our featured speaker will be Republican candidate for Oregon's next Governor - Dr. Bud Pierce. Learn more about his immigration policies. Decide for yourself who would make the best Oregon governor!

Whether you're a political news junkie, or you would rather just hear the high points during campaign season, you simply must pay attention to this election - our future hangs in the balance. While we are fairly certain our OFIR members are regular voting participants, we can't express enough what a pivotal election this will be. It's been a long time since Oregon voters have played much of a role in the Presidential election. It appears that this year we just might! While OFIR is a non-partisan, single-issue organization, the importance of the upcoming election cannot be overstated.

People vote for candidates based on many factors. OFIR focuses on a candidates IMMIGRATION policies only. Visit our website to learn more about other races: http://www.oregonir.org/immigration-topics/elections

The 2016 Primary election is Tuesday, May 17th.  If you're unsure about your voter registration, it's advisable to check it soon. You can do that online here.

OFIR welcomes all candidates running for any office to attend our meeting. If there is time at the end of the meeting, candidates will be given the opportunity to speak for 2 minutes. Please introduce yourself upon arrival!

Please invite a friend and come to our next OFIR membership meeting Saturday, May 7th at 2:00pm at the Best Western Mill Creek Inn across from Costco in Salem.
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Driving directions to Best Western Mill Creek Inn:

From I-5, take exit 253, which is the intersection of I-5 and State roads 22 and Business 99E. Go West on 22 (Mission St.) a short distance to Hawthorne Ave. (Costco will be on your right), Turn R on Hawthorne Ave. to the first left, which is Ryan Drive. Turn left on Ryan Drive, by Denny’s Restaurant, and proceed to Mill Creek Inn just beyond.
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Credibility in immigration policy can be summed up in one sentence: those who should get in, get in; those who should be kept out, are kept out; and those who should not be here will be required to leave."-- - Barbara Jordan, Chair, U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform, testimony to Congress, February 24, 1995.

Court Rules Oregon Attorney General Must Not Distort Language In Immigration Control Initiative

Advocates for immigration restriction in Oregon have stopped the state’s attorney general from distorting the language in a citizen initiative that seeks to stem the tide of local businesses hiring illegals.

In a ruling issued in early March, Justice Rives Kistler ruled in Kendoll v. Rosenblum that the modified language inserted by Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum into Initiative Petition 52 would mislead voters and moreover did not even properly communicate the effect of the initiative, were it become to law.

“[The measure] would require, as a matter of state law, that employers use a federal website to verify the authenticity of the documents that federal law requires only that they review,” the ruling stated. “That additional requirement is one major effect of the measure. The caption, however, does not highlight that effect.”

Rosenblum must now go back to the drawing board and change the ballot language to communicate its actual effect.

The measure states that business with five or more employees must confirm employees through E-verify, a federal website which checks out employment information, like social security numbers.

Oregonians for Immigration Reform (OFIR) forwarded the ballot-measure in response to data indicating that illegals comprise about 5 percent of the workforce in Oregon. Meanwhile, unemployment rates among black youth rest at about 55 percent.

If the measure is successful, Oregon would join the ranks of several other states with similar verification programs. Arizona’s implementation of a verification program proved to be the most controversial. Pro-immigration groups challenged Arizona’s law, a challenge which the Supreme Court picked up. Ultimately, the coalition comprised of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Hispanic nationalist groups, the Department of Justice and others failed to strike down the law.

Immediately after it came into play, illegal aliens started to pour out of the state, prompting outbursts of anger from Mexican officials, as the Mexican labor market was clearly struggling to accommodate the new surge of workers. For illegals, employment in the United States is attractive because average wages are 10 times higher than in Mexico. E-verify, then, is seen as an important step by immigration-control advocates to protect American wages from plummeting.

Dale Wilcox of the Immigration Reform Law Institute (IRLI), who served as OFIR’s co-counsel, said in a statement, “The ballot language written and certified by the attorney general hid the true purpose and effect of the initiative and would have only served to confuse voters.”

IRLI is also working to battle an attempt by illegals in Oregon to eliminate Measure 88, which prevents them from gaining driver’s licenses. This measure, five illegals are arguing, is unconstitutional.

Follow Jonah Bennett on Twitter

Send tips to jonah@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.
  Read more about Court Rules Oregon Attorney General Must Not Distort Language In Immigration Control Initiative

Activists Win Court Battle on Measure to Restrain Hiring of Illegal Aliens

A challenge was filed last year to ballot language certified by the Oregon attorney general.

The ballot measure, Initiative Petition 52 (2016) (IP 52), will be submitted to Oregon voters soon. If passed, IP 52 would require businesses with five or more employees to confirm that their employees are actually legally eligible to work. The measure was the work-product of Oregonians for Immigration Reform (OFIR).

The issue of illegal aliens working in local communities is not a small one for the Beaver State. Recent figures show that around five percent of the state’s workforce is illegal. Unemployment figures for black youth, for example, is as high as 55 percent.

In the ruling by the Oregon Supreme Court (attached below), Justice Rives Kistler writing for the court en banc notes that “Federal immigration law makes it unlawful for ‘a person or other entity *** to hire, or to recruit or refer for a fee, for employment in the United States an alien knowing the alien is an unauthorized alien.’”

The Court agreed with OFIR’s President Cynthia Kendoll that the state’s attorney general’s certified ballot language would be both defective and misleading to Oregon voters.

The attorney general, the opinion noted, wrote and certified the ballot language in a way that put too much emphasis on the new conditions proposed for obtaining and maintaining business licenses. Moreover, the Oregon attorney general was found to have failed to communicate the actual effect of the proposed law, i.e., that a potential employee’s eligibility documents will have to be confirmed by E-Verify, a federal website which verifies important information like one’s social security number.

Other states already have verification programs similar to the one being proposed in Oregon.

State efforts to curb employment of illegal aliens was given the green-light in 2011 by the United States Supreme Court when an employee-verification law in Arizona was challenged. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other business groups, Hispanic nationalist organizations and the Obama Justice Department, were fighting the effort. The open-borders coalition, which ultimately lost, challenged Arizona’s law as an impermissible regulation of immigration permissibly regulated only by the federal government, the U.S. Congress.

After the Arizona law was initially passed, reports began to surface of fears of a mass exodus of mostly Mexican illegal aliens going back to Mexico, in particular to the Mexican state of Sonora. Sonora is located in Northwest Mexico and shares a border with California, Arizona, and New Mexico. The reverse-flood sparked outrage among Mexican officials who traveled to the Arizona governor’s office to complain that their own labor markets and public resources could not handle the Mexican nationals that were returning. Mexican officials said it would have a devastating effect on the Mexican state.

Average wages in America are estimated to be ten times higher than those in Mexico and this fact has been referred to by experts as one of the “three magnets” for illegal immigration. The other two “magnets” are birthright citizenship and welfare benefits. Financial motivations are unquestionably a driving-force for illegal immigration.

According to a report by the Migration Policy Institute, “Migration from Mexico to the United States is primarily economically motivated. Nominal wage differentials have been hovering for years at about a 10-to-1 ratio, in favor of the United States, for manual and semi-skilled jobs. Moreover, a dynamic U.S. economy led to a strong demand for workers in seasonal agriculture, high-turnover manufacturing, construction, and the service industry. On the Mexican side, there have been enormous economic transformations, but not pronounced enough to absorb the growing working-age population.”

Measures such as E-Verify are viewed not only as important for protecting the living standards of Americans, they are also seen as key to ending social security and ID-fraud, a little-reported but major problem created when illegal aliens try to “pose” as eligible legal workers.

The Social Security Administration has estimated that around 75 percent of illegal “undocumented” aliens have actually obtained social security numbers, mostly by stealing them from U.S. citizens and legal residents. Researchers have found that the large majority of those whose numbers are stolen (mostly by underground gangs) are American children; thus, the theft goes unnoticed for years.

Commenting on the Oregon high court’s decision, OFIR’s co-counsel, Dale Wilcox of the Immigration Reform Law Institute (IRLI) told Breitbart Texas, “The ballot language written and certified by the attorney general hid the true purpose and effect of the initiative and would have only served to confuse voters.”

IRLI is a D.C.-based immigration-control advocate that helped write Arizona’s E-Verify law.

As reported by Breitbart Texas, IRLI is also fighting efforts by illegal aliens to get drivers licenses. The lawsuit in Oregon involves attempts by illegal aliens to nullify a successful 2014 ballot measure which sought to block efforts by the state legislature and governor to give driver’s cards to illegal aliens.

Wilcox calls this win in the employment verification case a victory for immigration-control advocates and the working people of Oregon.

Lana Shadwick is a writer and legal analyst for Breitbart Texas. She has served as an associate judge and prosecutor in Texas. Follow her on Twitter LanaShadwick2

 

  Read more about Activists Win Court Battle on Measure to Restrain Hiring of Illegal Aliens

So many opportunities to ask questions!

While NumbersUSA gives Sen. Merkley a grade of F for recent years 2013-2016 other Oregon Congressional delegates are not much better.  Please take every opportunity to ask the questions that need answers!

OFIR recommends that you view and print out a copy of your Congressman's voting report to give to them at any upcoming event they may be attending.  Below is Merkley's report card - it's shameful!

https://www.numbersusa.com/content/print/my/congress/1341/printreportcard//

If you’re able to attend a meeting and speak or ask a question of a candidate or member of Congress, please share the information with OFIR at ofir@oregonir.org.

For example:

In 2015 Sen. Merkley voted to continue funding President Obama’s unlawful Executive amnesties to illegal aliens. See details here. Ask him why he supports illegal immigration and illegal immigrants when they are taking jobs from Americans, causing widespread wage depression, and using tax-paid social benefits that should be reserved for U.S. citizens.

Other possible questions:

What are you doing to protect citizens from further harm by radical Jihadists? Persons claiming to be refugees from the Middle East cannot be adequately screened according to the Director of the FBI. A better way to help refugees is to cooperate with the United Nations in maintaining safe areas in countries near to the places of conflict.

An entry-exit system for checking visa holders was authorized for by Congress years ago and is urgently needed. Please make this a priority and work for its implementation immediately. The lack of a system enables open-ended illegal immigration.

Fraud and abuse of work visas is a scandal now, with employers importing foreign workers at lower wages by the thousands, forcing Americans to train them and then dismissing the citizen workers. What have you done to stop this?

Please work for mandatory use of the E-Verify program for all employers, for both new hires and current work forces. The system is accurate. Workers can verify their own Social Security records in the E-Verify program and thus protect their information.

Our country is overpopulated already resulting in severe environmental and social stresses. An annual overall limit on numbers of immigrants is urgently needed. It would be reasonable to set a moratorium on immigration for a temporary period of years and then limit the annual number of immigrants to about 200,000. Read more about So many opportunities to ask questions!

You're invited! Senator Merkley to Hold Town Hall in Washington County Saturday, March 12

Alert date: 
March 9, 2016
Alert body: 

Senator Merkley will hold a Town Hall for Washington County constituents on Saturday, March 12, in Tualatin. Please attend, if possible, and ask questions or make comments concerning immigration issues.

In his announcement, he says: "I invite all residents to come and discuss what we need to do to strengthen our state and our nation."  This is a great opportunity for you to attend and ask specific immigration related questions.

What: Washington County Town Hall

When:  Saturday, March 12, 2016, 3:00 PM

Where: Tualatin High School, 22300 SW Boones Ferry Road, Tualatin, OR 97062

NumbersUSA gives Sen. Merkley a grade of F for recent years 2013-2016.  We recommend that you view and print out a copy of his voting report to give to him:

https://www.numbersusa.com/content/print/my/congress/1341/printreportcard//

If you are able to attend the meeting and speak or ask a question, please share the information with OFIR at ofir@oregonir.org.

IRLI Wins Oregon Ballot Language Challenge

Alert date: 
March 4, 2016
Alert body: 

(Washington, D.C.) – Today, the Oregon Supreme Court handed down a decision in the case of Kendoll v. Rosenblum in favor of our client Oregonians for Immigration Reform (OFIR). IRLI, along with local counsel Jill Gibson of the Gibson Law Firm, brought a challenge in the Oregon Supreme Court to the biased ballot language certified by the Oregon attorney general for a citizen initiative (Initiative Petition 2016-52 or IP 52) filed by OFIR. IP 52 would require all Oregon employers with five or more employees to use E-Verify to verify with the federal government that every new employee is authorized to work in the United States.

In its decision, the Oregon Supreme Court found that the ballot language certified by the attorney general obfuscates the true purpose and effect of IP 52. The court stated regarding the ballot title, “We agree with petitioner that the caption fails to substantially comply with ORS 250.035(2)(a). Federal immigration law requires that employers review certain documents to ‘establish an employee’s eligibility for employment,’ and it prohibits employers from knowingly hiring unauthorized aliens. Whiting, 131 S Ct at 1974. IP 52, if enacted, would add an additional requirement to that federal law. It would require, as a matter of state law, that employers use a federal website to verify the authenticity of the documents that federal law requires only that they review. That additional requirement is one major effect of the measure. The caption, however, does not highlight that effect.” The court likewise found the questions that will be posed to voters and summary of the law defective and misleading. The court ordered the attorney general to re-draft the ballot language consistent with its decision.

Dale L. Wilcox, IRLI's Executive Director, commented, “The ballot language certified by the attorney general hid the true purpose and effect of IP 52 and would have only served to confuse voters.” Wilcox continued, “We are very pleased that the court rectified this wrong. This is a great victory for Oregonians and the American worker.”

For additional information, contact:

Dale L. Wilcox

202-232-5590

dwilcox@irli.org


 

Former state Rep. Jim Thompson files to run as an Independent

SALEM — Jim Thompson, a former Republican state representative, has filed to run for his old seat as an Independent Party of Oregon candidate.

Thompson served three terms in the house before losing to incumbent Rep. Mike Nearman, R-Dallas, in the 2014 primary....

Nearman positioned himself to the right of Thompson in the 2014 race. This year, he's sponsoring ballot measures to stop illegal immigration by requiring employers to use the federal E-Verify program and making people provide proof of citizenship when they register to vote.

Nearman is facing a Republican primary challenge... Read more about Former state Rep. Jim Thompson files to run as an Independent

E-Verify would help assure Oregonians, not illegal immigrants, hold Oregon jobs

This election season, Oregon has seen a textbook example of how leaders of "progressive" organizations take political positions that harm the people they purport to represent.

CAUSA, Oregon's self-proclaimed "immigrant rights organization," and a number of other groups have issued an open letter decrying "anti-immigrant forces . . . proposing statewide ballot measures targeting immigrant families."  I serve on the board of one of those allegedly "anti-immigrant forces" -- Oregonians for Immigration Reform.  And the way the letter says OFIR is "targeting immigrant families" is by spearheading a 2016 initiative to mandate that Oregon employers, via the federal E-Verify system, assure their new hires are U.S. citizens or legal residents.
 
We'll discuss that initiative shortly.  First, let's look at CAUSA and friends' letter.
 
CAUSA believes foreigners here in deliberate violation of U.S. law should enjoy the rights and benefits of legal residents and even U.S. citizens.  In recent years, the group has lobbied for illegal-immigrant "driver cards," taxpayer-funded college aid for illegal-immigrant students, and an end to federal-local partnerships that enforce immigration law -- positions diametrically opposite OFIR's.
 
That CAUSA would attack OFIR and its initiative, then, is no surprise.  The irony is this: Its letter was co-signed by leaders of organizations whose constituents are disproportionately harmed by the presence of illegal immigrants.
 
One signer, for example, is Nikki Fisher of The Bus Project.  This group provides political-engagement opportunities to (among other youths) high-school students.  But does its concern for youths' political opportunities extend as well to their economic opportunities?  
 
Teenagers, experts agree, benefit mightily from early work experience.  But opportunity for that experience is disappearing.  Between 2003 and 2013, Reese Lord of Portland's WorkSystems teen-placement program told the Portland Tribune, summer youth employment fell dramatically -- from 46 percent to 7 percent.  A large part of the reason?  Over that same period, the Federation for American Immigration Reform and other sources estimate, Oregon's illegal-immigrant population roughly doubled -- and, writes the Center for Immigration Studies' Dr. Steven Camarota, "immigrants and teenagers often do the same kind of work."  Indeed, Camarota notes, between 1994 and 2007, "a ten-percentage-point increase in the immigrant share of a state's workforce reduced the labor-force participation rate of U.S.-born teenagers by 7.9 percentage points."
 
Another signer is Julia Meier of the Coalition of Communities of Color.  The Coalition claims to represent, among others, black Americans -- who, the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics reports, currently suffer an unemployment rate of 9.4 percent, almost double the national rate of 5.0 percent.  One critical reason for this: Illegal immigrants now take millions of jobs in occupational fields which historically have employed large numbers of blacks.     

In 2014, for instance, blacks (as per the BLS) comprised 12.1 percent of construction-trades helpers, 14.6 percent of building-maintenance/groundskeeping workers, 13.4 percent of food-preparation workers, 15.3 percent of chefs and head cooks, and 23.5 percent of non-restaurant food servers.  But competing with blacks for employment in these fields are illegal immigrants who, the Pew Research Center has reported, in one recent year comprised 14 percent of workers in construction and extraction, 17 percent in building maintenance/groundskeeping, and 11 percent in food preparation and serving.
 
How does the Coalition of Communities of Color help black Americans by aligning itself with CAUSA, which champions illegal immigrants' "right" to compete with those Americans for the jobs many of them so desperately need?
 
Another signer is Meg Niemi of Service Employees International Union Local 49.  SEIU's members include lower-skilled Americans -- among them housekeepers, custodians and food-service workers -- who for decades have been harmed by the presence of illegal immigrants.
 
In a 2004 study, Harvard professor George Borjas estimated that "between 1980 and 2000, immigration reduced the average annual earnings of . . . natives without a high-school education . . . by 7.4 percent" -- and that half or more of that reduction was due to competition with illegal immigrants.  More recently, Eric A. Ruark and Matthew Graham reported in a FAIR study, even the liberal Center for American Progress has admitted that "reducing the illegal-alien population in the United States by one-third would raise the income of unskilled workers by $400 a year."
 
Now, back to OFIR's E-Verify initiative, which was lambasted by CAUSA et al.  What would that initiative do for young, black and unionized Oregonians?
 
Simple.  At a time when more than 110,000 Oregonians -- among them our most economically vulnerable -- still are unemployed, the initiative, if passed, would help assure the state's businesses employ U.S. citizens and legal residents and not illegal immigrants.  And far from "targeting immigrant families," it would help assure that immigrants who come here legally are not kept from jobs by those who don't.
 
On the issue of jobs and illegal immigration, young, black and unionized Oregonians are better served by OFIR than by their self-proclaimed champions.  In 2016, those Oregonians should support the E-Verify initiative that will advance their interests as jobholders, providers, and Americans.
 _________________________
 
Richard F. LaMountain, a former assistant editor of Conservative Digest magazine, serves on the board of directors of Oregonians for Immigration Reform.        

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