TX Leg won't mandate E-Verify because they know business can't function w/out undocumented immigrants

[j brown's body]

"Texas’ top Republican leaders have built a political brand on the state’s hard-line stance against illegal immigration, pouring billions of dollars into Gov. Greg Abbott’s state border security initiative, including funding construction of a border wall and deploying state police to arrest migrants on a newly created offense for trespassing. This session, lawmakers voted to require most sheriff’s offices to cooperate with federal immigration agents.

Yet again and again the state’s conservative Legislature has refused to take what some Republicans call the single most crucial step to preventing immigrants from coming and staying here illegally: mandating E-Verify to make it more difficult for them to work. ...This session, lawmakers filed about half a dozen bills attempting to require private companies to use the program. Kolkhorst’s legislation was the only one to make it out of either legislative chamber but eventually died because the state House did not take it up.

The resistance to E-Verify isn’t just about Texas Republicans’ reluctance to regulate business, Melmed said. It’s about how such a system could impact the state’s labor supply and economy. An estimated 1.3 million Texas workers, more than 8% of the state’s work force, are here illegally, according to a 2023 analysis of U.S. census data by the Pew Research Center, a nonpartisan think tank in Washington, D.C. About a quarter of all construction workers in Texas lack legal status, for example, and the industry faces a critical labor shortage as a need for housing booms. Likewise, the state’s understaffed agricultural, restaurant and elder care sectors rely on workers here illegally.

“If you got serious about applying [E-Verify], you would create even worse problems” with labor shortages, said Bill Hammond, a GOP former state lawmaker who once led the Texas Association of Business. “Do you want to go to a restaurant and use paper plates because no one will wash dishes?”

Texas’ political leaders know this, Hammond said, but they don’t want to publicly acknowledge it."


Link

Reminds me a bit of a drug addict.

 

[Ishm]

Just more maga hypocrisy. Nothing new!

 

[nota bene]

Also from the OP's article:

E-Verify supporters admit the system is not a panacea. The computer program can confirm only whether identification documents are valid, not whether they actually belong to the prospective employee, and as a result a black market for such documents has surged. Employers, too, can game the system by contracting out work to smaller companies, which in many states are exempt from E-Verify mandates.

Even when states adopt these, most lack strong enforcement. Texas legislators have never tasked an agency with ensuring all employers comply. South Carolina, which has among the toughest enforcement, randomly audits businesses to see if they are using E-Verify, said Madeline Zavodny, a University of North Florida economics professor who studied the program for a 2017 Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas report. But South Carolina does not check whether companies actually hired immigrants here illegally, said Alex Nowrasteh, vice president for economic and social policy studies at the libertarian-leaning Cato Institute in Washington, D.C. Some states have carve-outs for small companies or certain employers that often rely on undocumented labor. North Carolina, for example, exempts temporary seasonal workers.

The article concludes with a quote from an economist at the Brookings institution about how immigration is being used as a wedge issue and that expanding E-Verify "is “not really in anybody’s interest.”

 

[Integrityrespec]

"Texas’ top Republican leaders have built a political brand on the state’s hard-line stance against illegal immigration, pouring billions of dollars into Gov. Greg Abbott’s state border security initiative, including funding construction of a border wall and deploying state police to arrest migrants on a newly created offense for trespassing. This session, lawmakers voted to require most sheriff’s offices to cooperate with federal immigration agents.

Yet again and again the state’s conservative Legislature has refused to take what some Republicans call the single most crucial step to preventing immigrants from coming and staying here illegally: mandating E-Verify to make it more difficult for them to work. ...This session, lawmakers filed about half a dozen bills attempting to require private companies to use the program. Kolkhorst’s legislation was the only one to make it out of either legislative chamber but eventually died because the state House did not take it up.

The resistance to E-Verify isn’t just about Texas Republicans’ reluctance to regulate business, Melmed said. It’s about how such a system could impact the state’s labor supply and economy. An estimated 1.3 million Texas workers, more than 8% of the state’s work force, are here illegally, according to a 2023 analysis of U.S. census data by the Pew Research Center, a nonpartisan think tank in Washington, D.C. About a quarter of all construction workers in Texas lack legal status, for example, and the industry faces a critical labor shortage as a need for housing booms. Likewise, the state’s understaffed agricultural, restaurant and elder care sectors rely on workers here illegally.

“If you got serious about applying [E-Verify], you would create even worse problems” with labor shortages, said Bill Hammond, a GOP former state lawmaker who once led the Texas Association of Business. “Do you want to go to a restaurant and use paper plates because no one will wash dishes?”

Texas’ political leaders know this, Hammond said, but they don’t want to publicly acknowledge it."


Link

Reminds me a bit of a drug addict.

Not if Texas presented the new job opportunities properly. Texas is growing and getting rid of illegals would provide more jobs for those who already want to leave places like California and New York to move to Texas, Florida and others.

 

[aociswundumho]

“If you got serious about applying [E-Verify], you would create even worse problems”

That's true for just about everything the idiot government does.

Reminds me a bit of a drug addict.

That analogy doesn't work, because if you stop using the drug you are addicted to, you get better. Here, if you stop using "undocumented" labor, the economy gets worse.

 

[Phys251]

"Texas’ top Republican leaders have built a political brand on the state’s hard-line stance against illegal immigration, pouring billions of dollars into Gov. Greg Abbott’s state border security initiative, including funding construction of a border wall and deploying state police to arrest migrants on a newly created offense for trespassing. This session, lawmakers voted to require most sheriff’s offices to cooperate with federal immigration agents.

Yet again and again the state’s conservative Legislature has refused to take what some Republicans call the single most crucial step to preventing immigrants from coming and staying here illegally: mandating E-Verify to make it more difficult for them to work. ...This session, lawmakers filed about half a dozen bills attempting to require private companies to use the program. Kolkhorst’s legislation was the only one to make it out of either legislative chamber but eventually died because the state House did not take it up.

The resistance to E-Verify isn’t just about Texas Republicans’ reluctance to regulate business, Melmed said. It’s about how such a system could impact the state’s labor supply and economy. An estimated 1.3 million Texas workers, more than 8% of the state’s work force, are here illegally, according to a 2023 analysis of U.S. census data by the Pew Research Center, a nonpartisan think tank in Washington, D.C. About a quarter of all construction workers in Texas lack legal status, for example, and the industry faces a critical labor shortage as a need for housing booms. Likewise, the state’s understaffed agricultural, restaurant and elder care sectors rely on workers here illegally.

“If you got serious about applying [E-Verify], you would create even worse problems” with labor shortages, said Bill Hammond, a GOP former state lawmaker who once led the Texas Association of Business. “Do you want to go to a restaurant and use paper plates because no one will wash dishes?”

Texas’ political leaders know this, Hammond said, but they don’t want to publicly acknowledge it."


Link

Reminds me a bit of a drug addict.

They can't punish the employers who are enabling illegal immigration. That would shift the burden from poor brown people to rich white guys, and we can't have that.

 

[j brown's body]

Le

Also from the OP's article:

E-Verify supporters admit the system is not a panacea. The computer program can confirm only whether identification documents are valid, not whether they actually belong to the prospective employee, and as a result a black market for such documents has surged. Employers, too, can game the system by contracting out work to smaller companies, which in many states are exempt from E-Verify mandates.

Even when states adopt these, most lack strong enforcement. Texas legislators have never tasked an agency with ensuring all employers comply. South Carolina, which has among the toughest enforcement, randomly audits businesses to see if they are using E-Verify, said Madeline Zavodny, a University of North Florida economics professor who studied the program for a 2017 Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas report. But South Carolina does not check whether companies actually hired immigrants here illegally, said Alex Nowrasteh, vice president for economic and social policy studies at the libertarian-leaning Cato Institute in Washington, D.C. Some states have carve-outs for small companies or certain employers that often rely on undocumented labor. North Carolina, for example, exempts temporary seasonal workers.

The article concludes with a quote from an economist at the Brookings institution about how immigration is being used as a wedge issue and that expanding E-Verify "is “not really in anybody’s interest.”

It is very popular with the right-wing. Posters here are very supportive of it.

 

[rickc]

Same for the GOP United States Congress!

 

[Maidenrules29]

LOL....Illegal immigrants are not sustainable. Texas wants to keep the ones they already have who are keeping restaurants afloat and rich people's babies nannied, but not let any more in? If American kids weren't such divas and lazy we wouldn't need illegals for thise jobs, just HB seasonal workers for crops.

 

[Lycanthrope]

The right was never serious about illegal immigration. If they were, they'd demand businesses be held accountable for employing them.

 

[multivita-man]

"Texas’ top Republican leaders have built a political brand on the state’s hard-line stance against illegal immigration, pouring billions of dollars into Gov. Greg Abbott’s state border security initiative, including funding construction of a border wall and deploying state police to arrest migrants on a newly created offense for trespassing. This session, lawmakers voted to require most sheriff’s offices to cooperate with federal immigration agents.

Yet again and again the state’s conservative Legislature has refused to take what some Republicans call the single most crucial step to preventing immigrants from coming and staying here illegally: mandating E-Verify to make it more difficult for them to work. ...This session, lawmakers filed about half a dozen bills attempting to require private companies to use the program. Kolkhorst’s legislation was the only one to make it out of either legislative chamber but eventually died because the state House did not take it up.

The resistance to E-Verify isn’t just about Texas Republicans’ reluctance to regulate business, Melmed said. It’s about how such a system could impact the state’s labor supply and economy. An estimated 1.3 million Texas workers, more than 8% of the state’s work force, are here illegally, according to a 2023 analysis of U.S. census data by the Pew Research Center, a nonpartisan think tank in Washington, D.C. About a quarter of all construction workers in Texas lack legal status, for example, and the industry faces a critical labor shortage as a need for housing booms. Likewise, the state’s understaffed agricultural, restaurant and elder care sectors rely on workers here illegally.

“If you got serious about applying [E-Verify], you would create even worse problems” with labor shortages, said Bill Hammond, a GOP former state lawmaker who once led the Texas Association of Business. “Do you want to go to a restaurant and use paper plates because no one will wash dishes?”

Texas’ political leaders know this, Hammond said, but they don’t want to publicly acknowledge it."


Link

Reminds me a bit of a drug addict.

Republicans know that a lot of critical workers are visa overstayers or border-crossers. They chase them around anyway because they're easy to beat up on.

 

[Maidenrules29]

The right was never serious about illegal immigration. If they were, they'd demand businesses be held accountable for employing them.

It's similar to the Democrats and their gun control braying while they inteoduce gun control bills that they know will go nowhere. "We're doing something!"

 

[Lycanthrope]

It's similar to the Democrats and their gun control braying while they inteoduce gun control bills that they know will go nowhere. "We're doing something!"

Strange way to agree, but okay.

 

[Maidenrules29]

Strange way to agree, but okay.

Both sides are complete idiots.

 

[Lycanthrope]

Both sides are complete idiots.

I will only push back a little on this - yes, but one side actively celebrates idiocy.

 

[RF667799]

"Texas’ top Republican leaders have built a political brand on the state’s hard-line stance against illegal immigration, pouring billions of dollars into Gov. Greg Abbott’s state border security initiative, including funding construction of a border wall and deploying state police to arrest migrants on a newly created offense for trespassing. This session, lawmakers voted to require most sheriff’s offices to cooperate with federal immigration agents.

Yet again and again the state’s conservative Legislature has refused to take what some Republicans call the single most crucial step to preventing immigrants from coming and staying here illegally: mandating E-Verify to make it more difficult for them to work. ...This session, lawmakers filed about half a dozen bills attempting to require private companies to use the program. Kolkhorst’s legislation was the only one to make it out of either legislative chamber but eventually died because the state House did not take it up.

The resistance to E-Verify isn’t just about Texas Republicans’ reluctance to regulate business, Melmed said. It’s about how such a system could impact the state’s labor supply and economy. An estimated 1.3 million Texas workers, more than 8% of the state’s work force, are here illegally, according to a 2023 analysis of U.S. census data by the Pew Research Center, a nonpartisan think tank in Washington, D.C. About a quarter of all construction workers in Texas lack legal status, for example, and the industry faces a critical labor shortage as a need for housing booms. Likewise, the state’s understaffed agricultural, restaurant and elder care sectors rely on workers here illegally.

“If you got serious about applying [E-Verify], you would create even worse problems” with labor shortages, said Bill Hammond, a GOP former state lawmaker who once led the Texas Association of Business. “Do you want to go to a restaurant and use paper plates because no one will wash dishes?”

Texas’ political leaders know this, Hammond said, but they don’t want to publicly acknowledge it."


Link

Reminds me a bit of a drug addict.

In Illinois, they make some companies subject to liability for using E-verify. Those companies must tread very carefully if using it. Almost like they're trying to discourage its use.

 

[CaughtInThe]

 

[j brown's body]

In Illinois, they make some companies subject to liability for using E-verify. Those companies must tread very carefully if using it. Almost like they're trying to discourage its use.

Seriously, it would be easier, more humane and more effective to give them some kind of green card.

This whole illegal immigrant thing is absurd.

 

[bythoughts]

If not even Texas plans to deport the illegals, then why exactly are the National Guards and Marines out there?

 

[Maidenrules29]

If not even Texas plans to deport the illegals, then why exactly are the National Guards and Marines out there?

California did not plan on deporting illegals. ICE just went in and started doing it. And then the protesters who did not like it started getting violent, and started burning stuff, and throwing rocks at the police. The protesters started doing stuff first, the police merely responded. And when the chief of police in L.A. went on tv and said they are outnumbered, that's when the reinforcements were called in.

 

[Maidenrules29]

Seriously, it would be easier, more humane and more effective to give them some kind of green card.

This whole illegal immigrant thing is absurd.

It sure is absurd. Any person who wants to immigrate to this country needs to be vetted. We need to know who's coming into our country. And what kind of person they are.

 

[ClaraD]

California did not plan on deporting illegals. ICE just went in and started doing it. And then the protesters who did not like it started getting violent, and started burning stuff, and throwing rocks at the police. The protesters started doing stuff first, the police merely responded. And when the chief of police in L.A. went on tv and said they are outnumbered, that's when the reinforcements were called in.

Even undocumented immigrants understand sometimes there can be a chance they will be deported. That said there are right and wrong ways to do things.
Revoking legal status of legal immigrants without criminal records is absurd. Especially, when you revoke that status without warning.
Detaining and deporting someone who is the spouse of. a US citizen and that undocumented immigrant has zero criminal record it’s absurd to deport them instead of addressing the system flaw that doesn’t allow them to become legal. When we deport the spouse of a soldier we are morally bankrupt and have lost our sense of right and wrong.
If you deport the mother of a 4 year old US citizen child that is fighting cancer and are happy and encourage that then you aren’t a good person…anyone who is giddy about that is evil.
If you are gleeful that US citizens of Latino ancestry are being attacked by masked individuals that don’t show warrants or badges then you aren’t a real American and don’t believe in why this country was founded.

 

[RF667799]

Even undocumented immigrants understand sometimes there can be a chance they will be deported. That said there are right and wrong ways to do things.
Revoking legal status of legal immigrants without criminal records is absurd. Especially, when you revoke that status without warning.
Detaining and deporting someone who is the spouse of. a US citizen and that undocumented immigrant has zero criminal record it’s absurd to deport them instead of addressing the system flaw that doesn’t allow them to become legal. When we deport the spouse of a soldier we are morally bankrupt and have lost our sense of right and wrong.
If you deport the mother of a 4 year old US citizen child that is fighting cancer and are happy and encourage that then you aren’t a good person…anyone who is giddy about that is evil.
If you are gleeful that US citizens of Latino ancestry are being attacked by masked individuals that don’t show warrants or badges then you aren’t a real American and don’t believe in why this country was founded.

I don't believe the law is so corrupt in the service of tyranny that unlawful action has become necessary and justified.

YMMV

 

[Fledermaus]

They can't punish the employers who are enabling illegal immigration. That would shift the burden from poor brown people to rich white guys, and we can't have that.

Hmmmmm

California has no problem fining business owners for knowingly hiring illegal immigrants.

Knowingly is an issue though because employers are discouraged from digging to hard into documents used to gain employment.

 

[rickc]

Employers are required to properly fill out an I9 for each employee and keep it on file for three years in case ICE wants to review them. No need to send anything to the federal government for verification. If an employer is found to have hired an illegal worker and has a properly I9 form on file he is in no trouble.

Now some states have decided to require everify to verify employees are eligible to work. That changes the picture some. Seems if a contractor uses subs and their employees are not on the contractor's payroll they still won't be breaking any laws.