Immigration: Into the Mix of the National ID Card Debate

By Stella Templo
Immigration Attorney, The Law Offices of Spar & Bernstein

Last week, Senators Charles Schumer (D-NY) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC) unveiled their proposal to require every worker in the United States—citizen or not—to present a secured ID card to obtain a job in the U.S.

The main purpose of the cards is obvious—curbing the employment of undocumented workers. The assumption is that requiring the presentation of ID cards would dry up the incentive to come to the U.S. for foreigners unauthorized to work.

Before getting into the debate, I wish to thank Senators Schumer and Graham for taking action. Immigration, like social security, is a thankless issue. Any politician truly interested in solving the problem gets nothing but a headache in the process.

As a matter of politics, they would have scored more points by waiting for someone else to suggest something and then lob their criticisms.

So, to Senators Schumer and Graham, I’m not a huge fan of either of yours, but I always give credit where it’s due.

Bravo, gentlemen.

Now on to just a few of the concerns that come to mind.

The Privacy Problem. The ACLU is all over this problem. “It is fundamentally a massive invasion of people’s privacy,” said Chris Calabrese, legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union. “We’re not only talking about fingerprinting every American, treating ordinary Americans like criminals in order to work. We’re also talking about a card that would quickly spread from work to voting to travel to pretty much every aspect of American life that requires identification.”

Business Cost. A card that is able to read embedded biometric data sounds expensive. How will small businesses, which already pinch their pennies, manage to pay for a card reader?

Employers as Conspirators. My big problem with the whole “ID cards will solve everything” position is that it presupposes that the underlying problem is that foreigners are defrauding employers by producing tampered with, counterfeit or stolen identity documents. That premise should be rejected. The large and mid-size companies targeted for raid knew full well that they staffed their operations with undocumented and unauthorized aliens. Many other employers and their unauthorized employees in small businesses escape detection because of cash pay arrangements.

A few years ago, I was talking to a manager at a poultry processing facility. All of the pay checks issued were made out to U.S. citizens or permanent residents. The average age of the payroll employees was about 17.

A glance at the assembly line places the average worker age at about 40. The people on the payroll were not the people on the floor. The people on the payroll were mostly U.S. citizen children while the people on the floor were the children’s older, unauthorized relatives or friends. The company was aware of the danger of a raid but saw no other way of operating. The company did seem to have tried every method of recruiting American workers, including offering double wages to Americans, without success.

To stop identity “borrowing,” will the ID cards need to be presented every day? Will it glow a different color if in the possession of a person whose biometric data does not match? What do you do with conspirator employers? Workplace enforcement is complicated.