Govt pledges to end work-site raids
Foreign migrants not deportation targets
WASHINGTON: The Biden administration announced on Tuesday that it would not conduct mass arrests of workers living in the country illegally during enforcement operations at US businesses, a reversal from Trump administration policies and the latest signal to millions of immigrants that they were not priorities for deportation.
Known as work-site raids, such arrests have long been criticised by immigration advocates for spreading fear and dissuading workers from reporting labour violations out of concern that they would be arrested. So far, these raids have not been a fixture during the Biden administration.
Alejandro N Mayorkas, the Homeland Security secretary, said in a statement that enforcement efforts at work sites would instead focus on “unscrupulous employers who exploit unauthorised workers, conduct illegal activities or impose unsafe working conditions”.
He also asked for recommendations from the department’s immigration agencies over the next 60 days to identify policies and agreements that affected the enforcement of labour laws and how to “alleviate or mitigate” concerns and fear that workers without legal status had about exploitative employers.
The new policy comes during a critical labour shortage in the United States, precipitated by the coronavirus pandemic, and offers reassurances that workers in the US illegally are not at risk of being deported en masse. The new strategy also reflects promises that President Joe Biden has made about taking a softer approach to immigration policy than his predecessor did.
Some companies that rely on such workers pay them below the market rate for jobs, exploiting immigrants and undercutting competitors.
“Refocusing resources to counter exploitative employers is a necessary step in protecting the American labour market and workers,” said Rep Bennie Thompson (D-Mississipi) and the chairman of the Homeland Security Committee.
Republicans criticised the new policy. “This makes our country LESS SAFE and LESS SECURE,” the Republican National Committee’s research arm wrote on Twitter.
Workplace raids, which Mr Mayorkas described as “resource-intensive”, were a priority during the Trump administration, which targeted employers as well as immigrant workers. The goal was to dissuade immigrants from illegally crossing the border to work in the United States. The George W Bush administration started high-profile work-site raids in a bid to push Congress to pass an immigration overhaul, but lawmakers failed to reach a consensus.
The Obama administration sought to focus work-site enforcement efforts on employers who hired workers who entered illegally rather than on the workers themselves, prioritising audits of employee files. Still, the policy led to the firing of thousands of immigrant workers.
Employers are required by law to check whether the people they hire are legally permitted to work in the United States. Several administrations have pushed for a nationwide requirement to use a programme known as E-Verify to confirm that employees have permission to work in the country. But it currently remains voluntary for most employers.
Immigration advocates commended the new work-site enforcement strategy, but they said it was not a substitute for creating a path to citizenship for millions of immigrants in the US without permission.
“While we applaud today’s announcement to end workplace raids, we need more commitment from this administration to protect all 11 million undocumented immigrants from deportation, not just in their workplaces,” said Nicole Melaku, the executive director of the National Partnership for New Americans.