Department of Homeland Security New Rules Would Create Boundless Insecurity at the Workplace
Communities and congregations across faith lines gathered in Baltimore on October 11th in support of the myriad U.S. workers who can be caught in a misguided immigration status dragnet. With the failure of the administration and congress to pass comprehensive immigration reform in June of 2007, the White House and its Department of Homeland Security (DHS) concocted a new rule to appear tough on undocumented workers.
If new rules withstand a court challenge, the DHS will force the Social Security Administration (SSA) to become part of the immigration law enforcement apparatus. The purpose of the SSA—helping people access social security benefits—would be completely perverted.
Under
the new rule, many U.S. citizens and legal
resident workers will be terminated if they
happen to have erroneous SSA records and
fail to get them fixed within 90 days of
an SSA "no-match" letter being sent to an
employer. The letters indicate that a Social Security number does
not match with other information. Misspellings, name changes after
marriage, and a host of other factors make "no-match" letters unsuitable
in determining whether a worker is legally eligible for employment.
But
the rule would penalize employers who do
not fire a worker after 90 days. Many employers
may choose to fire workers as soon as they receive the letter, and
massive firings could be the result. In
addition, employers may use no-match letters
as a tool to get rid of workers who support
union organizing drives.
"It
is the clear religious and moral imperative
that we treat the stranger among us with
dignity and respect," said Kim Bobo, executive director of Interfaith
Worker Justice. "But
these new rules on no-match letters will lead
to widespread discrimination against anyone
who 'looks' foreign and will inevitably cause
large numbers of firings of all workers, including native-born
American citizens and legal residents."
The rule was scheduled to go into effect on September 14th and
SSA intended to send out notices to employers enforcing the new
rule beginning September 4th. The new notices were to be sent to
approximately 140,000 employers, affecting about eight million employees.
But after the National Immigrant Law Center (NILC), the American
Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the AFL-CIO and others filed a lawsuit
to stop DHS and SSA from instituting the new rule, a temporary injunction
was ordered stopping the letters from going to employers.
On October 10th, Federal District Judge Charles Breyer in San Francisco
ordered a preliminary injunction against the rule change. Judge
Breyer agreed that only Congress could institute such a sweeping
change, and that many people would be hurt if the DHS rule took
effect.
But this was not a final decision. DHS could decide:
- to wait for a final decision from Judge Breyer;
- to drop its new rule;
- to appeal to a higher court, all the way up to the Supreme Court.
DHS's rule could still be implemented. Interfaith Worker
Justice and the larger religious and labor communities have vowed
to work together to stop the administration's ever more far-reaching
immigration enforcement strategies—including out-of-control
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids and a 28% increase
in detention beds in the past year.
As people of faith, IWJ prayerfully calls on the Social Security
Administration and the Department of Homeland Security to end this
nightmare and drop its planned rule change. The SSA should continue
to help people receive their benefits, not be turned into immigration
police.
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