October 12, 2007
NYT Editorial
A Crackdown on Hold
A federal judge has halted a reckless plan by the Bush administration to use Social Security records for immigration enforcement. This is good news, not just for the American economy, which would have been crippled by the attempt to force millions of undocumented workers off the books, but also for the untold numbers of innocent citizens and legal residents who also would have been victims of the purge.
The judge, Charles R. Breyer of the Northern District of California,
ruled that the Department of Homeland Security could not enforce a new
rule requiring employers to fire workers if their Social Security
numbers could not be verified within 90 days. The assumption behind the
rule was that workers whose numbers did not match the Social Security
Administration’s database were illegal immigrants using fake or stolen
identities.
Judge Breyer recognized that assumption as deeply flawed and the
new rule as an unlawfully crude enforcement tool. The Social Security
database is riddled with errors not related to immigration status. Many
of the “no-match” letters — which call attention to database
discrepancies — involve legal residents.
“There is a strong likelihood that employers may simply fire
employees who are unable to resolve the discrepancy within 90 days,”
the judge wrote, even if the problem was caused by data-entry mistakes,
misspellings or name changes. He warned that the rule would cause
“irreparable harm to innocent workers and employers.” The A.F.L.-C.I.O,
a party to the lawsuit that led to the ruling, had estimated that about
600,000 of its members could receive the letters and be vulnerable to
firing.
Judge Breyer also scolded the administration for imposing a policy
change with “massive ramifications” for employers without a legal
explanation or a required survey of the costs and impact to small
businesses.
It is not the case — though infuriated hard-liners will insist
otherwise — that millions of undocumented workers are now being let off
the hook by a soft-headed judge. If the no-match crackdown had
proceeded, many workers without papers would still have found jobs in
the underground economy, perhaps worse ones or with better-forged
papers. Identity theft would have risen.
The shadow economy would have adapted, as always. The world of on-the-books employment would have suffered greatly.
The federal government has embarked on a disastrously one-sided
immigration strategy — pulling out one harsh enforcement tool after
another without having repaired the broken system. We have already seen
the results of runaway enforcement on the agricultural industry — a
shortage of workers leading to rotting crops and farmers relocating
south of the border. The trouble with crackdowns, like the foolish one
involving “no-match” letters, is that they cause oceans of pain and
havoc — not just for undocumented immigrants, but also for legal
residents and the economy — without actually solving anything.