As E-Verify becomes an immigration issue, restaurants weigh in
As Congress continues to discuss comprehensive immigration reform, one of the biggest issues businesses are watching is E-Verify, an online system that checks workers’ immigration status. The House version of the bill would make E-Verify mandatory for businesses, as it already is in Georgia, Alabama and South Carolina.
Since its inception in 1996, E-Verify has been criticized for being a burden to business — it provided inaccurate results and was too difficult to use for many small businesses focusing on day-to-day operations. But the program may be improving, according to a survey by the National Restaurant Assn. and ImmigrationWorks USA, which discusses immigration reform with businesses.
“You’re seeing wide adoption by a wide array of different kinds of restaurants,†said Tamar Jacoby, the president of ImmigrationWorks USA. “Four or five years ago, these numbers would have been unthinkable.â€
Though some applicants said they used the system because they were required to by their states, nearly two-thirds of companies said they enrolled voluntarily. About 80% said they’d recommend it to a colleague. Nearly 80% said the system had been completely accurate.
But there is a catch, said Angelo Amador, vice president of labor and workforce quality at the National Restaurant Assn. Once workers hear that E-Verify is in place at certain restaurants, those who don’t have proper documentation no longer apply, which can sometimes lead to labor shortages.
About 11% of restaurateurs said their pool of job applicants had changed significantly since they implemented E-Verify, and 34% said the pool had changed somewhat.
That’s why “we need to make a legal immigrant workforce available,†Jacoby said.
Labor and business leaders cleared a hurdle last month when they reached a compromise on low-wage immigrant workers, perhaps allowing more workers into the country.
Still, there are many groups that do not support E-Verify, including the ACLU, which has been a vocal opponent of the program. Errors in E-Verify keep people from working, the system is vulnerable to identity theft and it’s too expensive, Chris Calabrese said in a recent ACLU blog post about the issue. Calabrese is particularly concerned about a provision that would make states include driver’s license photos in E-Verify.
“Moves to mandatory E-Verify will create a bureaucracy and privacy risk that will affect us all,†he wrote.
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