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PROPOSALS FOR IMPROVING THE ELECTRONIC

EMPLOYMENT VERIFICATION AND WORKSITE

ENFORCEMENT SYSTEM

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON IMMIGRATION, 

CITIZENSHIP, REFUGEES, BORDER SECURITY, 

AND INTERNATIONAL LAW

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

APRIL 26, 2007

Serial No. 110–18

Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://judiciary.house.gov 

(II)

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

JOHN CONYERS, JR., Michigan, Chairman 

HOWARD L. BERMAN, California 

RICK BOUCHER, Virginia 

JERROLD NADLER, New York 

ROBERT C. SCOTT, Virginia 

MELVIN L. WATT, North Carolina 

ZOE LOFGREN, California 

SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas 

MAXINE WATERS, California 

MARTIN T. MEEHAN, Massachusetts 

WILLIAM D. DELAHUNT, Massachusetts 

ROBERT WEXLER, Florida 

LINDA T. SA ́ NCHEZ, California 

STEVE COHEN, Tennessee 

HANK JOHNSON, Georgia 

LUIS V. GUTIERREZ, Illinois 

BRAD SHERMAN, California 

TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin 

ANTHONY D. WEINER, New York 

ADAM B. SCHIFF, California 

ARTUR DAVIS, Alabama 

DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ, Florida 

KEITH ELLISON, Minnesota 

LAMAR SMITH, Texas 

F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR., 

Wisconsin 

HOWARD COBLE, North Carolina 

ELTON GALLEGLY, California 

BOB GOODLATTE, Virginia 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio 

DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California 

CHRIS CANNON, Utah 

RIC KELLER, Florida 

DARRELL ISSA, California 

MIKE PENCE, Indiana 

J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia 

STEVE KING, Iowa 

TOM FEENEY, Florida 

TRENT FRANKS, Arizona 

LOUIE GOHMERT, Texas 

JIM JORDAN, Ohio

PERRY APELBAUM, Staff Director and Chief Counsel 

JOSEPH GIBSON, Minority Chief Counsel 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON IMMIGRATION, CITIZENSHIP, REFUGEES,

BORDER SECURITY, AND INTERNATIONAL LAW

ZOE LOFGREN, California, Chairwoman

LUIS V. GUTIERREZ, Illinois 

HOWARD L. BERMAN, California 

SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas 

MAXINE WATERS, California 

MARTIN T. MEEHAN, Massachusetts 

WILLIAM D. DELAHUNT, Massachusetts 

LINDA T. SA ́ NCHEZ, California 

ARTUR DAVIS, Alabama 

KEITH ELLISON, Minnesota 

STEVE KING, Iowa 

ELTON GALLEGLY, California 

BOB GOODLATTE, Virginia 

DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California 

J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia 

LOUIE GOHMERT, Texas

UR MENDOZA JADDOU, Chief Counsel 

GEORGE FISHMAN, Minority Counsel 

(III)

C O N T E N T S 

APRIL 26, 2007

OPENING STATEMENT 

Page 

The Honorable Zoe Lofgren, a Representative in Congress from the State 

of California, and Chairwoman, Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, 

Refugees, Border Security, and International Law ........................................... 1

The Honorable Steve King, a Representative in Congress from the State 

of Iowa, and Ranking Member, Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, 

Refugees, Border Security, and International Law ........................................... 3

The Honorable John Conyers, Jr., a Representative in Congress from the 

State of Michigan, and Chairman, Committee on the Judiciary ..................... 4

WITNESSES 

The Honorable Elton Gallegly, a Representative in Congress from the State 

of California 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 7

The Honorable Ken Calvert, a Representative in Congress from the State 

of California 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 9

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 11

The Honorable David Dreier, a Representative in Congress from the State 

of California 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 12

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 14

The Honorable Silvestre Reyes, a Representative in Congress from the State 

of Texas 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 23

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 24

The Honorable Luis V. Gutierrez, a Representative in Congress from the 

State of Illinois 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 25

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 27

The Honorable Jeff Flake, a Representative in Congress from the State of 

Arizona 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 28

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 29

Mr. Randel Johnson, Vice President, Labor, Immigration & Employee Benefits, U.S. Chamber of Commerce 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 42

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 45

Mr. Robert Gibbs, Partner, Gibbs Houston Pauw, on behalf of the Service 

Employees International Union 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 55

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 57

Mr. Jim Harper, Director of Information Policy Studies, The Cato Institute 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 69

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 71

Ms. Jessica Vaughan, Senior Policy Analyst, Center for Immigration Studies 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 88

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 90

Page

IV

LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC., SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING 

Prepared Statement of the Honorable Zoe Lofgren, a Representative in Congress from the State of California, and Chairwoman, Subcommittee on 

Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security, and International 

Law ........................................................................................................................ 2

Prepared Statement of the Honorable John Conyers, Jr., a Representative 

in Congress from the State of Michigan, and Chairman, Committee on 

the Judiciary ......................................................................................................... 5

Prepared Statement of the Honorable Sheila Jackson Lee, a Representative 

in Congress from the State of Texas, and Member, Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security, and International Law ....... 6

APPENDIX 

MATERIAL SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING RECORD

Prepared Statement of Susan R. Meisinger, President and CEO, Society for 

Human Resource Management and Chair, HR Initiative for a Legal Resource .................................................................................................................... 105

Joint Statement of the Air Conditioning Contractors of America, the Associated Builders and Contractors, the Associated General Contractors, the 

Mason Contractors Association of America, the National Association of 

Home Builders, the National Roofing Contractors Association, the National 

Utility Contractors Association, and the Plumbing-Heating-Cooling Contractors—National Association .................................................................................. 128

Prepared Statement of the Electronic Employment Verification System Working Group by Angelo I. Amador, Co-Chair United States Chamber of Commerce; Kelly Knott, Co-Chair, Associated General Contractors of America; 

and Scott Vinson, Co-Chair, National Retail Federation/National Council 

of China Restaurants ........................................................................................... 136

Prepared Statement of the Essential Worker Immigrant Coalition .................... 143

Prepared Statement of the National Council of La Raza ..................................... 145

Prepared Statement of Tyler Moran, Employment Policy Director, National 

Immigration Law Center ..................................................................................... 152

(1)

PROPOSALS FOR IMPROVING THE ELECTRONIC EMPLOYMENT VERIFICATION AND 

WORKSITE ENFORCEMENT SYSTEM 

THURSDAY, APRIL 26, 2007

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON IMMIGRATION, CITIZENSHIP, 

REFUGEES, BORDER SECURITY, AND INTERNATIONAL LAW

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY, 

Washington, DC.

The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 9:42 a.m., in Room 

2141, Rayburn House Office Building, the Honorable Zoe Lofgren 

(Chairwoman of the Subcommittee) presiding. 

Present: Representatives Lofgren, Berman, Waters, Sa ́nchez, 

Ellison, King, Gallegly, and Goodlatte. 

Staff present: Ur Mendoza Jaddou, Chief Counsel; J. Traci Hong, 

Majority Counsel; George Fishman, Minority Counsel; and Benjamin Staub, Professional Staff Member. 

Ms. LOFGREN. I would like to open the hearing of the Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security, 

and International Law and welcome the Subcommittee Members, 

the witnesses, and the public. 

This is the Subcommittee’s fifth hearing on comprehensive immigration reform. This week, we have been focusing on the inability 

of existing paper and electronic systems to accurately verify the immigration status and employment eligibility of workers in the 

United States. 

Since one of the main reasons for undocumented immigration is 

the lure of jobs in the United States, it is imperative that comprehensive immigration reform include an employment verification 

system that prevents the employment of unauthorized immigrants. 

At our hearing on Tuesday, we learned that the employment 

verification systems created in 1986 and 1996 have failed to meet 

the critical need of verifying employment eligibility. 

We heard expert witnesses identify several problems with current Form I-9 paper employment eligibility verification systems 

created in 1986 and required to be completed by all employers and 

all workers in the United States each time a person gets a new job, 

as well as the Basic Pilot program created in 1996 and used voluntarily by 16,000 employers across the Nation. 

The problems included: the use of fraudulent documents, including the use of documents by a person other than to whom they belong to gain employment; an unacceptably high number of errors 

in the Social Security Administration and U.S. Citizenship and ImVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:02 Jul 24, 2007 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00005 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 H:\WORK\IMMIG\042607\34927.000 HJUD1 PsN: DOUGA
2

migration Services databases leading to false negatives for U.S. 

citizens, legal permanent residents, and other work-authorized individuals erroneously denied work authorization; employer discrimination against work-authorized individuals who look or sound 

foreign; problems in processes and protections for workers and employers who suffer from erroneous denials of employment 

verification; and concerns about the protection of SSA and USCIS 

data from theft exposure, and other privacy issues. 

These are serious and legitimate concerns that must be addressed so that we may move from today’s voluntary participation 

of 16,000 employers in the Basic Pilot program to mandatory participation by all 7 million employers in the United States. 

I look forward to the testimony of our witnesses today, all of 

whom provide proposals on employment verification. I am particularly interested in how each of the proposals presented here today 

will address the concerns raised during our Tuesday hearing. It is 

time for accurate and workable solutions on employment 

verification. 

Today’s hearing should be the first step in developing an appropriate system that accurately verifies the employment eligibility of 

workers in the United States to prevent the employment of unauthorized immigrants. 

I would now like to recognize our distinguished Ranking minority 

Member, Mr. Steve King, for his opening statement. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Lofgren follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE ZOE LOFGREN, A REPRESENTATIVE IN

CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA, AND CHAIRWOMAN, SUBCOMMITTEE ON

IMMIGRATION, CITIZENSHIP, REFUGEES, BORDER SECURITY, AND INTERNATIONAL

LAW

I would like to welcome the Immigration Subcommittee Members, our witnesses, 

and members of the public to the Subcommittee’s fifth hearing on comprehensive 

immigration reform. 

This week, we have been focusing on the inability of existing paper and electronic 

systems to accurately verify the immigration status and employment eligibility of 

workers in the U.S. Since one of the main reasons for undocumented immigration 

is the lure of jobs in the U.S., it is imperative that comprehensive immigration reform include an employment verification system that prevents the employment of 

unauthorized immigrants. 

At our hearing on Tuesday, we learned that the employment verification systems 

created in 1986 and 1996 have failed to meet the critical need of verifying employment eligibility. 

We heard expert witnesses identify several problems with the current Form I-9 

paper employment eligibility verification system, created in 1986 and required to be 

completed by all employers and all workers in the U.S. each time a person gets a 

new job, as well as the Basic Pilot program, created in 1996 and used voluntarily 

by 16,000 employers across the nation. The problems included:

• The use of fraudulent documents, including the use of documents by a person 

other than to whom they belong, to gain employment;

• An unacceptable high number of errors in the Social Security Administration 

(SSA) and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) databases 

leading to ‘‘false negatives’’ where U.S. citizens, legal permanent residents, 

and other work authorized individuals are erroneously denied work authorization;

• Employer discrimination against work authorized individuals who look or 

sound foreign;

• Problems in processes and protections for workers and employers who suffer 

from erroneous denials of employment verification;

• Concerns about the protection of SSA and USCIS data from theft, exposure, 

and other privacy issues;

3

These are serious and legitimate concerns that must be addressed so that we may 

move from today’s voluntary participation of 16,000 employers in the Basic Pilot 

program to mandatory participation by all seven million employers in the U.S. 

I look forward to the testimony of our witnesses today, all of whom provide proposals on employment verification. I am particularly interested in how each of the 

proposals presented here today will address the concerns raised during our Tuesday 

hearing. 

It is time for accurate and workable solutions on employment verification. Today’s 

hearing should be the first step in developing an appropriate system that accurately 

verifies the employment eligibility of workers in the U.S. to prevent employment of 

unauthorized immigrants.

Mr. KING. Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate you holding 

this hearing today. 

Today’s hearing is a continuation of last Tuesday’s hearing on 

the Basic Pilot Employment Eligibility Verification System. We will 

examine what we can do to make that system work better, especially to combat identity fraud. 

I appreciate these two hearings on the topic since accurate employment eligibility is essential in order to have successful U.S. immigration policy. 

Illegal employment is the biggest incentive for illegal immigration and if we don’t do everything we can to end the job magnet, 

we will never have national security or economic security. 

I am pleased that our first panel of witnesses consists of several 

of our House colleagues who have taken leadership roles on this 

issue. Mr. Calvert has reintroduced his bill to make the use of the 

Employment Eligibility Verification System, the Basic Pilot program, as we know it, make them use that for all U.S. employers 

and phase it in over a 7-year span. 

That phase-in system was laid out by Mr. Calvert’s legislation. 

It is an inspiration for the Employment Eligibility Verification provisions in last year’s Border Protection, Antiterrorism and Illegal 

Immigration Control Act. It passed the House by a vote of 239 to 

182. 

Aside from the use of the Basic Pilot Employment Eligibility 

Verification program, the other way to ensure employment eligibility is the use of machine-readable, tamperproof biometric Social 

Security card by all jobseekers. Mr. Dreier has proposed that in 

H.R. 98, the Illegal Immigration Enforcement and Social Security 

Protection Act of 2007. He developed it along with Border Patrol 

Union Chief T.J. Bonner, who has been before this Committee a 

number of times. Such a card would directly combat the theft or 

misuse of a Social Security number. 

Mr. Gallegly, a longtime Member of this Subcommittee and the 

deputy Ranking Member, has introduced several pieces of legislation aimed at improving the Employment Eligibility Verification 

process. For instance, H.R. 136 would require the Social Security 

Administration to notify DHS, the Treasury Department, and the 

individual rightfully possessing a Social Security number that has 

been submitted by one employer eight or more times at at least 

four different addresses. And H.R. 850 would require the IRS to 

withhold and tax refunds of earned income tax credit from any 

alien whose work authorization had expired but did not stop working in the United States. Commonsense proposals. 

At Tuesday’s hearing, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration 

Services witness discussed the Basic Pilot program, or the EEVS, 

4

in general and some of the improvements that have been brought 

forward to the system. I was particularly interested in the fact that 

the system works so quickly. Over 92 percent of the inquiries get 

a response within 3 seconds, and I have run that system myself 

and the longest delay I could find was 6 seconds. But 99.8 percent 

of U.S.-born citizens receive confirmation in that period of time. 

We also heard the exception here, which I think we need to pay 

attention to. Foreign-born employees have been more likely to receive a tentative non-confirmation, though. A total of 1.4 percent 

of work-authorized employees received a tentative non-confirmation. So it worked pretty good. 

In the past, there was often a 6 to 9 month delay between an 

immigration’s arrival in the United States and the availability of 

information in the DHS databases for verification purposes. That 

delay is now down to around 10 days. 

USCIS is taking steps to improve EEVS, the Basic Pilot. They 

are conducting a pilot program that allows employers to make sure 

the worker standing in front of them matches the picture on file 

with the DHS employment authorization documents. USCIS is adding more data source to the database and monitoring for patterns 

of fraud, employment discrimination, and employer misuse. These 

are steps in the right direction, and it is open to making even more 

improvements. 

For the most part, the witnesses at Tuesday’s hearing agreed 

that the biggest problem facing the EEVS system is it vulnerability 

to identity theft. To combat this, DHS must have access to Social 

Security Administration data so it can investigate situations in 

which a single Social Security number was submitted more than 

once by a single employer or where a number was submitted by 

multiple employers in a manner that suggests fraud. 

Of course, Mr. Dreier’s proposal deals with identity fraud directly. One question, though, is whether there is consensus for a 

biometric Social Security card. I am interested in the witnesses’ 

testimony today. I recognize there are also proposals brought forth 

by Mr. Reyes this morning, and by the Flake-Gutierrez proposal 

that we will hear this morning and I am interested in that testimony as well. 

It is really pleasing to me to see this kind of activity on the part 

of Members, the leadership role that has been taken. I look forward 

to your testimony. 

I thank you again, Madam Chair, and I yield back. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you, Mr. King. 

We are pleased to be joined by the Chairman of the full Judiciary 

Committee today, and I would now invite Chairman Conyers for 

any opening remarks that he may have. 

Mr. CONYERS. Thank you so much. I would like permission to put 

my statement in the record. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Without objection. 

Mr. CONYERS. And I just want to congratulate this new LofgrenKing alliance that is leading us through a subject-matter by subject-matter inquiry into this huge, complex subject. I am very 

proud of the way that you are moving on this. 

The only point I wanted to make in my whole statement is this 

problem of worker exploitation or retaliation. You see, when a comVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:02 Jul 24, 2007 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00008 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 H:\WORK\IMMIG\042607\34927.000 HJUD1 PsN: DOUGA
5

pany like Swift wants to help find out who is a legal worker and 

who isn’t, and it turns out that this is like putting cheese out for 

a mouse, then you spring on the people that have provided you the 

information and, guess what, you are the bad guy. And that is not 

going to attract a lot of support as we go along. 

We have got to have safeguards, and the privacy concerns must 

be taken into consideration. And I am so happy to see this thoughtful group of Members putting their bills and ideas right on the line. 

Let’s put everything—whatever you have got, put it on the table, 

ladies and gentlemen, because this train is moving out and we are 

going to come out with a bill. It is resolved. 

And the challenge for us is how do we do it and accommodate 

so darned many competing interests, and it is in that spirit that 

I issue and extend a warm welcome to you, and I congratulate our 

Subcommittee Chairwoman. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Conyers follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE JOHN CONYERS, JR., A REPRESENTATIVE

IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF MICHIGAN, AND CHAIRMAN, COMMITTEE ON THE

JUDICIARY

Earlier this week, the Subcommittee held a hearing examining problems in the 

current employment verification and worksite enforcement systems. Today, we have 

an opportunity to study possible solutions to these problems. 

One possible solution concerns the electronic employment verification system, also 

known as ‘‘EEVS.’’ This system is now recognized as playing an increasingly critical 

role in comprehensive immigration reform. To ensure that the system will—in fact—

actually be a solution, it must be efficient, enforceable, and evenhanded. And, there 

must be safeguards to prevent abuse. 

Let me explain each of these requirements. 

First, EEVS must be efficient. Without doubt, the verification requirements of the 

1986 immigration law reforms became substantially undermined by the increasing 

availability of fraudulent identification documents. While pilot programs established 

under the 1996 immigration law reforms sought to verify the identity of prospective 

employees through government databases, these programs have been plagued with 

bureaucratic red tape and extensive false negatives. 

Clearly, if an employment verification system is not reliable and easy to use, employers simply will not utilize it and we will simply be left—again—with a broken 

immigration system. For example, we learned earlier this week about the odyssey 

of a staffer on this very Subcommittee who encountered the problem of ‘‘false negatives’’ when she began her employment with us. One can only imagine how different 

her experience would have been if she was a low-wage worker in a rural area without the support of a Congressional subcommittee behind her. Clearly, an EEVS system must be fair to everyone, not just the educated or informed users. 

Second, this system must be enforceable and evenhanded. By this, I mean that 

the system should have appropriate incentives and sanctions. As we heard the other 

day from one company that tried to comply with a pilot verification program in good 

faith, it paid substantial consequences. We should not punish employers that voluntarily seek to comply with Federally-sanctioned employment verification programs. 

Third, the system must have safeguards so that it does not become a tool of worker exploitation or retaliation whether in response to formal organizing activities or 

as a way to punish individual employees who demand their rights as workers. Unscrupulous employers should not be allowed to profit from worksite enforcement. 

Also, as part of these safeguards, privacy concerns must be taken into account both 

from the perspective of the employee and the employer. 

I am pleased that some of our colleagues who introduced bills in this Congress 

concerning employment verification systems are here to discuss their respective proposals and to share their insights on reform. I extend a warm welcome to each of 

you for your hard work on this important issue. 

I, of course, express equal appreciation to our other witnesses from the business 

community and the public policy sectors. I am particularly pleased that the representative from the Service Employees International Union is joining us today. All 

too often, anti-immigrant forces have tried to insert wedges in the labor community 

6

by alleging that immigrants will steal American jobs and undercut unionization efforts. 

Today’s debate on the employment verification system today will certainly contribute to our efforts to enact immigration law reforms that will result in a system 

that is controlled, orderly, and fair.

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you, Mr. Conyers. 

In the interest of proceeding to our witnesses and mindful of our 

schedules, I would ask that other Members submit their statements for the record within 5 legislative days. And, without objection, all opening statements will be placed in the record. 

Without objection, the Chair is authorized to declare a recess of 

the hearing at any time. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Jackson Lee follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE SHEILA JACKSON LEE, A REPRESENTATIVE

IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF TEXAS, AND MEMBER, SUBCOMMITTEE ON IMMIGRATION, CITIZENSHIP, REFUGEES, BORDER SECURITY, AND INTERNATIONAL LAW

Today marks the fourth hearing in a series of hearings dealing with comprehensive immigration reform. This subcommittee previously dealt with the shortfalls of 

the 1986 and 1996 immigration reforms, and most recently the difficulty that employers encountered when they attempted to verify that potential foreign employees 

have work authorization. We heard testimony from Marc Rosenblum that false negatives occur during the I-9 process therefore employers err on the side of caution, 

making it more difficult for legitimate documented workers to find employment. 

Certainly making a mistake can be costly to an employer. 

We heard testimony from the VP of Swift Meat Packing Company, John Shandley. 

Mr. Shandley mentioned that they were sued by the Department of Justice (DOJ) 

for going too far in trying to determine the employment eligibility of a potential employee. Eventually they would settle the case for less than $200,000. Likewise, the 

recent raid on Swift plants cost the company over $31 million in lost revenue. More 

than 1,200 employees were detained, while Immigration & Custom Enforcement 

(ICE) officers searched for undocumented workers. Despite their difficulties with 

employment verification, Mr. Shandley expressed an eagerness to assist us in coming up with practical solutions to this problem, as Swift held no ill will towards 

Members of Congress. 

As we move towards a practical solution, and consider various proposals to improve employment verification I want to reemphasize the three ‘‘E’s’’ articulated by 

Stephen Yale-Loehr, enforcement, evaluation, and entry. There has been a consistent lack of enforcement on the part of the federal government. Violations of the 

employment verification provisions may result in civil penalties ranging from $100–

$1,000 per employee. However, only 417 Notices of Intent to Fine were issued in 

FY1999, 178 in FY2000, 100 in FY2001, 53 in FY 2002, 162 in FY 2003, and only 

three (3) in FY 2004. How can we address the problem if the agency deemed responsible for enforcing our laws has not maintained their responsibilities? 

Along those same lines we must address the enormous use of fraudulent documents that occurred as a result of the 1986 and 1996 immigration reform. When 

Mr. Yale-Loehr spoke about evaluation he stressed the difficulty that employers encounter when they evaluate the documents that a potential employee presents for 

verification. Likewise the Basic Pilot Program can only verify that a social security 

number exist. The Basic Pilot Program can not tell a prospective employer that the 

person presenting the social security number is actually the individual to whom the 

social security number belongs. Finally let us speak about entry. Keeping in mind 

that practicality is the key to comprehensive immigration reform, Mr. Yale-Loehr 

mentioned the need for a temporary guest worker program. While I am a staunch 

supporter of protecting our borders, and enforcing our immigration laws, we must 

find a way to effectively deal with the 12 million undocumented workers already 

here. A guest worker program may be a possible solution. 

In conclusion let me say that every single employer in the United States will be 

impacted by the new employee verification mandates Congress enacts as part of 

comprehensive immigration reform. Therefore the system must be workable, simple, 

and reliable. We must also recognize that employers in the United States are vastly 

different in both size and levels of sophistication, and any verification system that 

we employ must accommodate those differences. It is time to end the confusion 

7

within the employer verification system because the consequences for individual 

workers and the economy are significant.

Ms. LOFGREN. We have two distinguished panels of witnesses 

here today to help us consider the important issues before us. In 

our first panel, we are very grateful to each Member for being here. 

We know how busy your schedules are. We have brought together 

Members of the House of Representatives who have introduced 

bills with provisions on employment eligibility verification systems 

in this Congress to discuss their proposals with us. 

I would note that Mr. Gallegly, a Member of our Subcommittee, 

has a written statement that will be included in its entirety in the 

record but has asked that he not be a witness because he has another commitment that he is going to run off to do, and we respect 

that request on his part. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Gallegly follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE ELTON GALLEGLY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN

CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

Madam Chairwoman, thank you for holding this important hearing on one of the 

most critical issues that must be addressed if our country is serious about reducing 

illegal immigration—the development and implementation of an efficient and secure 

worksite enforcement system. 

Illegal immigration is one of the most serious problems facing our nation. The 

high number of immigrants crossing the border illegally has overwhelmed our 

schools, hospitals and communities. It is also a direct threat to our national security 

and counter-terrorism efforts. Illegal workers also hurt American workers by taking 

jobs and keeping wages and benefits down. 

Under current law, a person must provide a social security number in order to 

get a job. In many cases, an illegal immigrant simply provides a false name and 

social security number. In other cases, an illegal immigrant adopts the identity of 

an American who is unaware that his identity has been stolen until he is refused 

a loan or contacted by an irate creditor. 

The federal government could stop misuse of Social Security numbers, but has 

failed to do so. My legislation would change that. 

Every year, employers are required to file W-2 forms with their workers’ names, 

social security numbers and addresses. Currently, when the Social Security Administration receives multiple W-2 forms with the same social security number and different names, it simply ignores it—even when it is obvious that more than one person is using a Social Security number. 

In other cases, when an employer files a W-2 with a name and Social Security 

number that does not match, the government simply mails the worker a letter. 

That’s it. There is little or no follow-up. 

This has led to a serious accounting problem in the Social Security program. A 

GAO report found that as of November 2004, the Social Security Administration has 

been unable to resolve discrepancies involving 246 million W-2’s—involving $463 billion—that were filed with names and Social Security numbers that do not match. 

A bill I introduced, H.R. 138, the Employment Eligibility Verification and AntiIdentity Theft Act, would solve this problem by requiring workers to resolve discrepancies involving their name and Social Security number. 

A companion bill, H.R. 136, the Identity Theft Notification Act would require the 

Social Security Administration to investigate if it receives information that more 

than one person is using one Social Security number. 

If there is evidence of fraud and identity theft, the Social Security Administration 

would be required to contact the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for prosecution. It would also be required to notify the innocent owner of the Social Security 

number, so that he can take steps to protect his good credit and good name. 

I have also introduced H.R. 849, the Stop the Misuse of ITINs, which would require the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to notify the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) when it receives a W-2 indicating that a foreign national is working 

illegally. IRS would also be required to notify the employer that the worker does 

not have proper work authorization. 

8

Finally, H.R. 850, the IRS Illegal Immigrant Information Act, would require that 

each December the DHS provide IRS with a list of the people whose work authorization or employment-based visa expired before the calendar year. 

If a return is filed by someone working illegally, IRS would be required to notify 

DHS. The IRS would also notify the employer that the worker does not have proper 

work authorization and withhold any refund due or Earned Income Tax Credit 

claimed. 

For example, in December 2007, DHS would provide IRS with the names and Social Security numbers of foreign nationals whose work authorization or employmentbased visa expired before December 31, 2006. If the IRS receives a W-2 in January 

of 2008 indicating that the person continued to work in 2007, the IRS would notify 

both IRS And the worker’s employer. 

All four of these bills would give the worker an opportunity to resolve the discrepancy or provide proof of current employment authorization. 

Enacting these proposals, in addition to requiring that all employers use an improved Basic Pilot Program, will substantially reduce the number of people illegally 

crossing the border. This will allow the border patrol to concentrate on securing our 

borders against terrorists, drug smugglers and other criminals. 

Madam Chairwoman, thank you again giving me this opportunity to explain my 

proposals. I look forward to working with you and the distinguished Ranking Member to identify additional ways to reduce the number of people who come to this 

country illegally.

Ms. LOFGREN. Let me go to the other Members who are able to 

testify before us today. 

First on the panel, and who arrived first in the room, Congressman Ken Calvert represents the 44th Congressional District of 

California. Throughout his 15 years of congressional service, Mr. 

Calvert has been instrumental in advancing legislation to protect 

against identity theft. Prior to his tenure in Congress, Representative Calvert directed Ken Calvert Real Properties. 

Representative Dave Dreier has been a Member of the United 

States House of Representatives since 1981, representing California’s 26th Congressional District. He has served in many leadership capacities over the years, from Chair of the House Rules Committee as well as his current position as Chair of the Republican 

Congressional Delegation from California, where he and I very 

often collaborate. He graduated with a bachelor’s from Claremont 

McKenna College in 1975 and received his master’s from Claremont Graduate School in 1976. 

Congressman Silvestre Reyes has served in the House for 11 

years as a Representative from the 16th District in Texas, but 

began his career with the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization 

Service and the U.S. Border Patrol. He started as a Border Patrol 

Agent, rising through the ranks to immigration inspector, instructor at the Border Patrol Academy and assistant regional commissioner in Dallas, Texas. During his time with the Border Patrol, 

Congressman Reyes was known as an effective and innovative 

manager of the border and, of course, we know him as somebody 

we can rely on with expertise here in the House. 

Representative Luis Gutierrez has represented the 4th Congressional District of Illinois since 1993. Throughout his service in the 

House, he has worked as a stalwart leader on comprehensive immigration reform. Mr. Gutierrez chairs both the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, and the Democratic Caucus, respective Immigration 

Task Forces. He also sits before us as a senior Member of this Subcommittee. Before his arrival in Washington, Congressman Gutierrez worked as a teacher, social worker, community activist and city 

official. He graduated from Northeastern Illinois University. 

9

And, finally, we are expecting Congressman Flake, who is on his 

way to testify. Mr. Flake is serving his fourth term representing 

the 6th Congressional District of Arizona. Before serving in the 

House, Mr. Flake was Executive Director of the Foundation for Democracy, a foundation monitoring the southern African nation of 

Namibia’s independence process and, following his work at the 

Foundation, he was named the Executive Director of the Goldwater 

Institute. Mr. Flake graduated from Brigham Young University, 

where he received a BA in international relations and a master’s 

in political science. 

So we will begin with—you all know the drill. Your entire written statement is part of the record, but we would invite you to 

make an oral statement. 

And we will start with you, Ken Calvert. 

TESTIMONY OF THE HONORABLE KEN CALVERT, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA 

Mr. CALVERT. Thank you. I thank my colleague from California 

and friend, Chairwoman Lofgren, Ranking Member Steve King, 

and the entire Subcommittee for inviting me to testify on my bill, 

The Employment Eligibility Verification System. 

As you know, there are approximately 16,000 employers using 

the Basic Pilot program, and the program continues to evolve to 

meet new demands. As you heard this past Tuesday, it is incorporating a photo tool to enable employers to better verify the identity of non-citizen new hires. The Basic Pilot program is also exploring other ways to deter and detect fraudulent documents, 

fraudulent or other improper use of the system in instances where 

employers fail to properly follow program procedures. 

The program is developing a system to flag multiple uses of Social Security numbers in different locations. The Basic Pilot program has been steadily preparing to go mandatory and is currently 

capable of handling 25 to 40 million queries a year. 

My legislation, HR 19, would make the Basic Pilot program mandatory over a period of 7 years. Companies with 10,000 employees 

or more would be required to be compliant a year after enactment. 

Companies with 5,000 employees or more would be required to be 

compliant until after 2 years and so on down to businesses with 

fewer than 100 employees, which would be required to be compliant after 7 years. My bill does not require employers to retroactively check employees already hired, only newly hired employees. 

The current Basic Pilot program was created from legislation I 

drafted in the 104th Congress. The legislation was included in the 

omnibus consolidated appropriations act of 1997 and several Members of both the Subcommittee and full Judiciary Committee voted 

in favor of the bill. In the 107th Congress and the 108th Congress, 

the Basic Pilot program was extended and expanded. Both bills 

were agreed to by voice vote in the House. 

I recognize there are concerns about the current Basic Pilot program. The program was not originally designed to catch identity 

theft, and I understand this is a desirable capability to add. However, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Service is beVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:02 Jul 24, 2007 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00013 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 H:\WORK\IMMIG\042607\34927.000 HJUD1 PsN: DOUGA
10

ginning to address this problem through the development of a 

photo tool and a new monitoring and compliance office that will 

analyze system usage by employers to detect compliance issues 

leading to follow-up or referral to Immigration and Custom Enforcement and the Department of Justice. 

The question before this Subcommittee and Congress is how best 

to build upon an effective, working program for which Congress has 

voted for three times. To create a new program from scratch would 

be a step backwards that would be hard to explain to budget-conscious taxpayers. 

The Basic Pilot program has the ability and authority to address 

the concerns regarding identity theft and with the support of Congress through the passage of H.R. 19, our country will continue to 

have a working employment verification system with a decade of 

experience behind it. 

Thank you again for inviting me to testify, and I welcome any 

questions you may have. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Calvert follows:]

11

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE KEN CALVERT, A REPRESENTATIVE IN

CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA


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Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you, Mr. Calvert, and for your leadership 

on this issue. 

Congressman Dreier? 

TESTIMONY OF THE HONORABLE DAVID DREIER, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA 

Mr. DREIER. Thank you very much, Madam Chairwoman and Mr. 

King and Chairman Conyers, Mr. Gallegly, Mr. Goodlatte. 

I must say, as I listen to Chairman Conyers talk about this great 

Lofgren-King combo that is here, I can’t help but tell you that I am 

here to offer what I think really builds on that and is the closest 

thing to a panacea for this. 

Not only do I have as lead cosponsor of my bill, H.R. 98 Silvestre 

Reyes, but this is a bill that has, as cosponsors, Elton Gallegly, Bob 

Goodlatte, Mr. King; you, Madam Chair—I don’t know if you are 

a cosponsor, you have certainly indicated an interest in support of 

it. But I will tell you that I know that Maxine Waters has been a 

cosponsor along with Tom Tancredo and Grace Napolitano. 

It really is to me the one measure that we have on this issue of 

dealing with immigration reform that does really go all the way 

across the spectrum philosophically. 

In the last Congress, as we all know, we had 10 votes on what 

Mr. King really appropriately in his opening remarks described as 

focusing on the supply side, increasing the size of the Border Patrol, Silvestre’s former colleagues, the building of the fence, utilizing unmanned aerial vehicles and motion detectors. All of this 

stuff focused on the supply side and virtually nothing focused again 

on what Mr. King talked about, the demand side, the magnet that 

draws people into this country illegally. 

Now, this legislation that Silvestre and I have introduced, we call 

it H.R. 98. Why? Because 98 percent of the people who come into 

this country illegally come here for one reason. They are looking for 

economic opportunity. They are looking to feed their families. They 

are looking for a job. And if we can end that magnet that draws 

people into the country illegally and at the same time, we hope, see 

the economy of Mexico and other countries enhanced to the point 

where people aren’t fleeing those countries, I believe that we can 

turn the corner and, frankly, bring what would be tantamount to 

an end to this problem. 

Now, what we call for is a smart, counterfeit-proof Social Security card. My brilliant staffer Matthew Daniel Tully has just given 

me his original Social Security card. He is a young guy. I don’t 

know where in the hell mine is. I lost it years ago. But it is nothing 

but a flimsy piece of paper, which is what anybody had going back 

to 1935. 

Not one attempt whatsoever has been made to update since 1935 

the Social Security card. Now, I am not a proponent of a national 

ID card, but I do know this: if we were to establish a smart, counterfeit-proof Social Security card—that is not biometric by the way, 

Mr. King, all is it is it has an algorithm strip on the back that the 

employer would swipe, and that card would go with information 

that the Government already has, no new information, as to whether this person is an American citizen, if they are here on an H-1B 

13

visa, H-2A, whatever, and I know you are looking at new descriptions of those visas. But they would have—whether or not that person is in fact a qualified worker. 

And then that information would come back and the employer 

would get this, yeah or nay, and they could then hire that person. 

One of the big problems we have had, of course, is lack of enforcement. And I opposed the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act not only because of amnesty but because of employer sanctions. But we have employer sanctions today. As we all know, they 

are not enforced. I didn’t want to see small businessmen and 

women turned into Border Patrol agents. I left that to Silvestre 

Reyes and his colleagues. 

The fact of the matter is we have it today. There is a lack of enforcement. And what we have seen, and Chairman Conyers raised 

this by talking about one particular company, we have seen many 

people out there knowingly hiring people who were here illegally. 

Well, what we do with this card is people in this country looking 

for a new job, anyone looking for a new job, whether you are a citizen or not, you would have to have one of these cards. Now, no 

retiree would have to have one of these cards. We are reelected, we 

don’t need to have one of these cards. We only see people who are 

in the job force, looking for a new job, required to have one of these 

cars. 

And I believe that going through a 2-year phase-in, we could utilize this as a means to take place of the combination of 94 different 

documents, as we well know, that people utilize to get their jobs, 

I mean, to qualify. I mean school ID cards, library cards, you know, 

obviously Social Security cards, and one of the real problems has 

been a real abuse of the Social Security system. 

Now, our problem has been, frankly, the Ways and Means Committee and the Finance Committee in the Senate and some in the 

White House who have opposed this. I have been talking about this 

until I was blue in the face for the last 3 years. And I hope very 

much that we can—I have testified before the Ways and Means 

Committee on this, their Social Security Subcommittee, and I am 

hoping very much that we can get them to move on it. There are 

a number of people who are concerned about getting the Social Security Administration involved in this. 

I hope very much, Madam Chair, that we can in fact move forward and incorporate this as a very important part of our process. 

And I thank you all very much for listening to me. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Dreier follows:]

14

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE DAVID DREIER, A REPRESENTATIVE IN

CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA


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Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you very much, Congressman Dreier. 

Congressman Reyes? 

TESTIMONY OF THE HONORABLE SILVESTRE REYES, A 

REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF TEXAS 

Mr. REYES. Thank you, Madam Chair and Members of the Committee and Chairman Conyers. Thank you so much for holding this 

hearing and agreeing to take on what is an important part of what 

I think is our national security landscape. 

I mention that because whatever the figure is, and we don’t 

know what that figure is exactly, between 9 million and 12 million 

people are living in a shadow world in our country today. So it is 

incumbent upon us as Members of Congress to work and find a 

way to greatly reduce or eliminate this shadow world because we 

are concerned that there may be those in that shadow world, in our 

country, that are here to harm us and have that potential as long 

as that shadow world exists. 

I am very proud to be here with my colleagues because I know 

all of us want to find a solution to this perplexing issue and I am 

particularly proud of my two colleagues here to my left, Congressman Flake and Congressman Gutierrez, for the legislation that I 

have endorsed that is comprehensive in nature. 

I think that if we are going to be successful, if we are going to 

be able to address the issue that is facing us today, you have to 

have three very critical components. You have to have legalization, 

you have to have border security and you have to have a guest 

worker program. So I am proud to endorse their legislation, and I 

hope all Members of Congress take a close look at that. 

We were at the White House yesterday. I will let Congressman 

Gutierrez talk more about that meeting, at least I hope he does, 

because we had a meeting with President Bush, who is very much 

interested for the same reasons of national security that we address this. 

I am also proud to have had a role in H.R. 98 with my colleague 

David Dreier, and actually we have introduced this the last three 

Congresses, and we have testified a number of times before this 

Committee and other Committees about this proposal. I was thinking as David was speaking. In 1977 I headed up the first computer 

program to create a system that would identify potential legal visitors to this country. It was called the Alien Documentation Identification and Telecommunications System. That was in 1977. 

I find it incredible, and I find it appalling, that with all of the 

advances in telecommunications, all of the advances in computers 

and our ability to be able to monitor, that we haven’t come up with 

a system like H.R. 98 or perhaps one like my colleague Mr. Calvert 

was talking about, that we haven’t utilized technology to give us 

a system that does three very important things: increases our security by knowing who is coming into our country; secondly, gives employers the ability to verify conclusively and therefore takes them 

out of the loop in terms of responsibility as to who they are hiring 

and who is on their payroll; and, third, puts the onus on the Department of Homeland Security, where it should be, to enforce our 

Nation’s immigration laws. 

24

So I am proud to be part of this effort. I hope that we in this 

Congress are serious about comprehensive immigration reform. We 

can’t afford to postpone it a day more. And when people talk about 

the cost that it is going to entail, I would remind all of us, the cost 

of another hit like the one we took on 9/11. This is an investment 

in ourselves. This is an investment in the future for our children, 

and our grandchildren, and the security of our country. It is a national security issue. 

And that is why I believe that comprehensive immigration reform with those three components—legalization, a guest worker 

program and border security, which includes what H.R. 98 does—

is so critical and so important. That was our message to President 

Bush yesterday. It is I think an understandable and cohesive message that everybody needs to understand on both the House and 

the Senate side. 

So thank you very much for taking on this issue. I do have a 

written statement. 

Ms. LOFGREN. The written statement will be included in the 

record. 

Mr. REYES. And I will be glad to answer any questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Reyes follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE SYLVESTRE REYES, A REPRESENTATIVE IN

CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF TEXAS

I would like to begin by thanking Chairwoman Zoe Lofgren and Ranking Member 

Steve King for holding this very important hearing today. As the lead Democratic 

cosponsor of H.R. 98, the Illegal Immigration Enforcement and Social Security Protection Act, I have been pleased to work with my friend and colleague from California, Mr. Dreier, on the bill, and I appreciate his leadership on this issue. 

Before coming to Congress, I served for 261⁄2 years in the U.S. Border Patrol. Half 

of the time I was a Border Patrol Sector Chief, first in McAllen, then in El Paso. 

As the only Member of Congress with a background in border enforcement, I have 

first-hand knowledge of what we need to do in order to reduce illegal immigration 

while keeping our borders and the nation safe. 

I have always said that we need a comprehensive immigration reform plan with 

three main components: strengthened border security; earned legalization for those 

who qualify; and a guest worker program with tough employer sanctions. Comprehensive reform is like a three-legged stool. Without one leg, the stool topples. 

I applaud the Committee for today’s hearing and for gaining insight about one of 

the three components: the need for stricter employer sanctions. I have witnessed 

firsthand the difference that tough employer sanctions can make in discouraging attempted illegal entries into the United States. 

In 1986, the Immigration Reform and Control Act passed Congress and contained 

provisions which would penalize employers who hire illegal immigrants. After enactment, in parts of the country such as the border region where those of us in law 

enforcement had the resources to enforce those sanctions, there was a dramatic decrease in illegal entries into the United States. Clearly, once word got out that illegal immigrants were not being hired, the incentive to enter the United States was 

gone and attempted entries dropped off considerably. 

H.R. 98 would expand and improve on the Immigration Reform and Control Act 

by enhancing the protection of Social Security cards and allowing employers to instantaneously verify a prospective employee’s eligibility to work in the United 

States. The bill would also increase civil and criminal penalties for employers who 

hire illegal immigrants or fail to verify their employment eligibility. 

If properly funded and with appropriate oversight and privacy protections, H.R. 

98 would be an important step toward halting the flow of people seeking to enter 

the United States illegally in order to find employment. Our immigration and border 

security personnel will then be able to focus more of their time, effort, and resources 

on those who may be trying to enter the country to do us harm. 

If we are really serious about enacting comprehensive immigration reform, we 

must include tough employer sanctions as one of the proposals within the final bill. 

25

Thank you for allowing me to testify on behalf of H.R. 98, and I look forward to 

continue to work with the Subcommittee in the future.

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you so much. 

Congressman Gutierrez? 

TESTIMONY OF THE HONORABLE LUIS V. GUTIERREZ, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF ILLINOIS 

Mr. GUTIERREZ. Chairwoman Lofgren, Subcommittee Ranking 

Member Mr. King, full Committee Chairman Mr. Conyers, and I 

have to say all of my colleagues here, Mr. Dreier, Jeff Flake and 

Silvestre Reyes, I am really delighted and it is such a pleasure to 

be here with people with such a wealth of valuable information. 

And I always said that Silvestre always brings such a great historical perspective given what he did before he came here to serve 

in the Congress of the United States, and I thank him for bringing 

that very valuable bipartisanship here and bipartisanship yesterday, Madam Chairwoman, at the White House, where we brought 

these issues up. 

And I wanted to say that because of Silvestre Reyes’ historical 

knowledge, Congressman Pastor from Arizona and Xavier Becerra 

from California and I said to the President, we need enforcement, 

but we don’t need roundups of innocent individuals throughout our 

community, and we were able to speak with not only the knowledge 

of our conviction but with the historical knowledge that Silvestre 

Reyes brought us about what Ronald Reagan was able to do when 

he approached the issue of comprehensive immigration reform back 

in 1986 and halted the severe worker raids that were hurting people and say we wish to help and our broken immigration system. 

Let me begin by saying that an employment verification system 

must be part of a comprehensive immigration reform. We will be 

setting ourselves up for continued failure if such a system is not 

implemented with strong border security, a new visa program for 

future workers and a tough but fair earned legalization program 

for the estimated 12 million unauthorized individuals currently living and working. 

With that important point in mind, I would like to focus my testimony today on the employment verification system in STRIVE, 

which would allow the shortfalls of our current system to be corrected. 

The Electronic Employment Verification System in STRIVE 

would require the creation of a biometric, machine-readable, tamper-resistant Social Security card. In addition to this card, the bill 

limits the number of other documents an employer could accept as 

proof of identity and work eligibility and require that they be biometric in some instances. 

Going back to what Mr. Dreier said about the multiple uses, we 

need to limit what an employer can accept. It can’t be just everything. That wouldn’t help us. 

Limiting the number of documents to those that are secure and 

tamperproof would help to eliminate the lucrative market of false 

documents, but we need to do more. The STRIVE Act also requires 

DHS to set up a system to prevent identity theft and individuals 

from misrepresenting themselves. Establishing an employment 

verification system that will apply to all workers in the U.S. is a 

26

massive undertaking and must be approached prudently with a roll 

out plan that is contingent upon the system’s accuracy. 

Going back to Mr. Calvert, who has a 7-year roll out period, it 

is going to take years, Madam Chairwoman. I don’t know how we 

do it well and be fair to American workers unless we do it that 

way. 

STRIVE phases in the use of our system, starting with critical 

infrastructure employers, followed by large, then small, employers. 

H.R. 1645 also requires the Comptroller General to certify on an 

annual basis that the verification system is responding accurately 

and effectively to employer queries before it can be expanded. 

Performance benchmarks are essential to employer confidence in 

the system and to prevent U.S. citizens and others who are workauthorized from being denied eligibility to work. 

Individuals will also be allowed to check their own records for accuracy. In addition, workers can contest inaccurate determinations 

of the system; if wrongfully denied work eligibility they will have 

the right to administrative review, lost wages and, if necessary, judicial review. 

The mandatory expansion of such a system also raises legitimate 

privacy concerns. Technology, such as encryption, regular testing of 

the system and implementing regular security updates, would have 

to be used. Information to be stored in the system would also have 

to be limited and could only be used for employment verification 

purposes. 

The bill also provides and levies stiff penalties for unlawful access or modification of employment system information. In its annual review, the Comptroller General must also certify that our 

system is protecting the privacy of records in the system. 

Witnesses before this Subcommittee have testified that employment discrimination has been an inherent problem under the current system. The STRIVE Act forbids employers from using the 

system to discriminate against job applicants or employees on the 

basis of nationality; terminating employment due to an initial tentative non-confirmation; using the system to screen potential employees; reverifying outside of the law the employment status of an 

individual; or, using the system selectively. 

Last point: we cannot have a robust employment verification system without equally robust enforcement. Increased penalties for individuals who falsely attest to being authorized to work and employers who do not comply with the new system’s requirements or 

knowingly hire unauthorized. Our bill also debars employers from 

using the system for Government contracts, grants, and agreements who violate the system. 

With regard to enforcement resources, the STRIVE Act requires 

Immigration and Customs, ICE, to spend at lease 25 percent of 

their time. 

I would submit the rest of the testimony, but I would like to say 

that we must make sure as we roll out the system, Madam Chair, 

that there be safe harbors for employers. If an employer is using 

our system, our Federal system, and they are doing it in good faith 

and they are checking it and they hire those that are undocumented, we must also provide a safe harbor for them as we protect 

employees, we protect employers until we perfect our system. 

27

Thank you so much, Madam Chair. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Gutierrez follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE LUIS V. GUTIERREZ, A REPRESENTATIVE

IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF ILLINOIS

Chairwoman Lofgren, Ranking Member King and my colleagues on the Subcommittee, thank you for this opportunity to testify on my and Congressman Jeff 

Flake’s proposal in the STRIVE Act, H.R. 1645, to improve the electronic employment verification and worksite enforcement system. 

Like a number of witnesses who have recently come before this Subcommittee, I 

want to begin my comments with what I think is the most essential element in 

crafting an employment verification system that works. That is, the system must 

be part of comprehensive immigration reform. If such a system is not implemented 

with strengthened, coordinated border security, a new visa program that provides 

the future workers our economy needs, and a tough, but fair, earned legalization 

program for the estimated 12 million unauthorized individuals currently living and 

working underground, we will be setting ourselves up for continued failure on this 

front. 

I would like to focus my testimony today on addressing how the employment 

verification system proposed in STRIVE would address or fix the shortfalls of the 

current system, as identified by recent witnesses’ testimonies before this Subcommittee. 

ANY EMPLOYMENT VERIFICATION SYSTEM MUST PREVENT DOCUMENT FRAUD

The Electronic Employment Verification System (EEVS) in the STRIVE Act, first 

and foremost, would require the creation of a biometric, machine readable, tamperresistant social security card. In addition to this fraud-proof card, the only other 

documents an employer could accept to prove identity and work eligibility under the 

new system are a U.S. passport; a state driver’s license or identity card that meets 

the requirements of PL 109–13 (REAL ID); a permanent residence or green card; 

or a tamper-proof employment authorization card issued by the Department of 

Homeland Security. 

Requiring a limited number of secure documents would be a great step forward 

in eliminating the lucrative market of false documents, but we need to do more. To 

prevent individuals from using valid documents that are not, in fact, their own, the 

STRIVE Act also requires the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security 

to establish reliable and secure ways under the new verification regime to determine 

if the information in the system’s databases match the hired employee whose eligibility is being verified. 

EEVS MUST MAINTAIN AND PROVIDE ACCURATE DATA AND OTHERWISE BE RELIABLE

ENOUGH TO INSTILL CONFIDENCE IN THE SYSTEM

Establishing an employment verification system that will apply to all workers in 

the U.S. is a massive undertaking and must be approached prudently, under a realistic timeline and with a roll out plan to the entire workforce that is contingent 

upon the system’s accuracy. STRIVE phases in the use of the EEVS, starting with 

critical infrastructure employers, followed by large, then small, employers. 

H.R. 1645 also requires the Comptroller General to certify on an annual basis 

that the verification system is responding accurately and effectively to employer 

queries before it can be expanded. It is essential to build in performance benchmarks so that employers have confidence in the system, and are not tempted to circumvent it. We also want to prevent U.S. citizens, legal residents and others workauthorized from being denied eligibility to work. 

Individuals will also be allowed to check their own EEVS record for accuracy. 

If the verification process results in a tentative nonconfirmation or a final nonconfirmation of a worker who is, in fact, work authorized, STRIVE ensures recourse for 

the worker. 

In the case of a tentative nonconfirmation, a worker is granted 15 business days 

to contest it. If a worker is wrongfully denied work eligibility (‘‘final nonconfirmation’’) by EEVS they will have a right to administrative review, lost wages in the 

case of an error caused by the system itself, and, if necessary, judicial review. 

EEVS AND THE PROTECTION OF PRIVACY AND SECURITY OF INFORMATION

The mandatory expansion of such a system also raises legitimate privacy concerns. DHS, in consultation with the Social Security Administration (SSA), would 

have to design and operate the system so that privacy is safeguarded by the techVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:02 Jul 24, 2007 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00031 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 H:\WORK\IMMIG\042607\34927.000 HJUD1 PsN: DOUGA
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nology used (use of encryption, regular testing of the system and implementing regular security updates). Information to be stored in the databases would also be limited to the individual’s name, date of birth, social security number, employment authorization status, the employer’s name and address and record of previous inquiries 

and outcomes. 

Such information could be used for employment verification purposes only, and 

the bill prohibits and levies stiff penalties for the unlawful access or modification 

of EEVS information. 

In its annual report reviewing benchmarks for the system’s roll out, the Comptroller General must also certify that the EEVS is protecting the privacy of records 

in the system. 

PROTECTION OF INDIVIDUALS FROM DISCRIMINATION

Recent witnesses before this Subcommittee have discussed how employment discrimination has been an inherent problem under the current employer sanctions regime and the Basic Pilot program. The STRIVE Act forbids employers from using 

the new system to discriminate against job applicants or employees on the basis of 

nationality; terminating employment due to a tentative nonconfirmation; using the 

system to screen employees prior to offering employment; reverifying the employment status of an individual in violation of the law; or, using the system selectively. 

Civil fines for unfair immigration-related employment practices are also increased 

and additional funding is authorized for the dissemination of information to employers, employees and the general public about the rights and remedies of these protections. 

THE NEED FOR ROBUST ENFORCEMENT

Of course, we cannot have a robust employment verification system without 

equally robust enforcement. H.R. 1645 creates significant criminal penalties for individuals who falsely attest to being authorized to work, civil penalties for employers 

who do not comply with the new system’s requirements and criminal penalties for 

knowingly hiring unauthorized workers. Our bill would also debar employers who 

repeatedly violate these provisions from government contracts, grants, and agreements. 

In addition, the bill requires DHS to establish a complaint and investigation process regarding potential violations related to hiring or continuing to employ unauthorized workers. 

With regard to enforcement resources, the STRIVE Act requires Immigration and 

Customs Enforcement (ICE) to spend at lease 25 percent of their time on worksite 

enforcement. 

In sum, the Employment Eligibility Verification System in the STRIVE Act would 

address a number of the shortfalls of the current system as created by the immigration laws passed in 1986 and 1996. As we all know, the current system does not 

work, and perhaps most troubling, it does nothing to prevent illegal immigration or 

the employment or exploitation of unauthorized workers. As part of a comprehensive 

solution to our broken immigration system, I believe that the EEVS in STRIVE will 

provide us with a system that is tough, fair and works to bring both employers and 

workers under the rule of law. 

Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you. 

And we finally have Congressman Flake. 

TESTIMONY OF THE HONORABLE JEFF FLAKE, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF ARIZONA 

Mr. FLAKE. Thank you, Chairwoman Lofgren and Ranking Minority Member King and Chairman Conyers. It is great to be back 

in the Judiciary Committee for the first time since my involuntary 

leave. I appreciate being invited, and I appreciate the way that you 

are conducting these hearings and the seriousness with which you 

are addressing this issue. This is important today, to talk about the 

importance of comprehensive reform, in particular employment 

verification. 

29

I am glad to be here with this panel, with Mr. Calvert, the father 

of Basic Pilot, basically, who has done so much good work there, 

and David Dreier, with the secure Social Security card, which we 

incorporated into our legislation. And I think that we have got a 

good package here. 

Since Luis did such a good job explaining what our legislation 

does in this regard, let me just kind of talk a little bit about the 

need for it and why this is so important. We need to always remember that of the illegal population that is here, it is estimated 

between 12 million and 20 million, there are really no good estimates, but the best ones seem to be about 7.2 million in the workforce. The bulk of those have managed to deceive their employer 

somehow with unsecure documentation, documentation that is 

fraudulent. So we have to have a way to combat that. 

There are some tools out there right now. Basic Pilot is out there. 

But we need to go further than that. I should note that Swift, the 

meatpacking plant, Swift, I believe, had been using Basic Pilot 

since 1997. Basic Pilot does a great job of telling you whether or 

not a Social Security number is valid. But there are limitations on 

whether it can tell you whether that same Social Security number 

is being used 500 times. 

And so we have got to attack the identity theft and fraud issue, 

and that is why it is so important to use the Dreier language and 

go further. And Luis is exactly right in talking about the need to 

do it thoughtfully and to roll it out well and to make sure that employers have those tools and have the confidence to use them as we 

go forward. 

As we have mentioned before, there are four real main elements 

to comprehensive reform. Obviously, we need more border security. 

We need a mechanism to deal with those who are here illegally 

now. We need a guest worker plan moving forward so we won’t find 

ourselves in the same pickle we are in today, not having a legal 

framework to bring people in that our economy so desperately 

needs. 

But most important here, the lynchpin to everything, is to make 

sure that employment can be verified. Forty percent of those who 

are here illegally didn’t sneak across the border. They came legally 

and overstayed. And they simply have found their way into the 

workforce. So we can do all we want to at the border, but we 

haven’t solved the problem unless we have employer verification, 

and that is what this is all about. 

I am glad to be here with this distinguished panel. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Flake follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE JEFF FLAKE, A REPRESENTATIVE IN

CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF ARIZONA

Thank you, Madam Chairwoman, for holding this important series of hearings on 

various aspects of immigration policy, and for inviting me to testify. The ability of 

employers to quickly and accurately verify the authorization of their employees to 

work in the United States will be a crucial component of getting a handle on our 

broken immigration system. 

EMPLOYMENT VERIFICATION IS CRUCIAL TO COMPREHENSIVE REFORM

We have heard various estimates—and, of course, no one can know the true number for sure—of how many people are illegally present in the United States. The 

number most consistently used is 12 million. Of those 12 million, the Congressional 

30

Research Service estimates that 7.2 million people are unauthorized workers in the 

civilian labor force. That figure represents five percent of the U.S. labor force. These 

workers have either fooled their employers with false documents and identity fraud, 

or are working for an employer aware of their status. I believe that most workers 

fall into the former category, rather than the latter. 

Simply put: many of those that are here in our country illegally are here for employment. However, they did not all risk an illicit border crossing to get here. According to a Pew Hispanic Center survey published last year, nearly half of those 

who are here illegally didn’t sneak across the border. Rather, they entered the country legally through a port of entry like an airport or a border crossing checkpoint 

and overstayed their visas. Over the past 15 years, we have tripled the size of the 

Border Patrol and increased its budget tenfold. Congress has gone so far as to mandate the construction of a wall on our southern border. And still they come. 

Border enforcement alone won’t solve our illegal immigration problem. Border enforcement is a crucial component of a comprehensive solution to solving the problem 

of illegal immigration, along with resolving the status of the millions of undocumented aliens, fixing backlogs in legal immigration, and ensuring interior enforcement of our immigration laws. A guest worker program that provides employers 

with the legal workforce of essential workers they so desperately need is essential 

to ensuring that our immigration laws are enforced. Clearly, as is the focus of this 

hearing, fixing our broken immigration program will also require a workable and 

fraud-proof employment verification system. 

As I am sure many of you are aware, measures to ensure that those that are unauthorized to work in the U.S. are prohibited from doing so are not new to the immigration reform debate. 

1986 ATTEMPT AT EMPLOYMENT VERIFICATION

The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 (IRCA) made it illegal for employers to knowingly hire, recruit, or refer for a fee, or continue to employ an alien 

who is not authorized to be so employed. IRCA’s employer sanctions also included 

penalties, both civil and criminal, for those violating the prohibition on unauthorized employment. However, under the 1986 law, employers were deemed to have 

met their obligation if the document presented to verify work authorization ‘‘reasonably appeared on its face to be genuine.’’ This approach was almost universally derided as fruitless, due to the prevalence of fraudulent documents and the ease with 

which undocumented workers could obtain them. Unauthorized workers could easily 

find employment, either by presenting counterfeit documents or stealing another’s 

identify. 

1996 ATTEMPT AT EMPLOYMENT VERIFICATION

A decade later, Congress again sought to solve the problem of unauthorized employment when it included the Basic Pilot program in the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996. As many of you are aware, Basic 

Pilot is a voluntary, online verification system that allows employers to confirm the 

eligibility of new hires by checking the personal information they provide against 

federal databases. Originally started in 1997 with limited geographic availability, 

the system is currently available nationwide, but suffers from severe limitations including the fact that it is still voluntary and prone to fraud. 

The raids of the Swift meat packing plants in December illustrated more clearly 

than anything else the limitation of the Basic Pilot program. The company had been 

trying for years to comply with our inept and broken immigration system. They 

were actually sued for overzealously inquiring into the backgrounds of job applicants 

suspected of presenting fraudulent documents—this became the basis for a discrimination lawsuit by the Department of Justice. Swift has participated in the Basic 

Pilot Program since its inception in 1997, but was well aware of its shortcomings—

namely, the program does not catch identity theft by workers. Employers can check 

whether an applicant has presented a valid Social Security number, but Basic Pilot 

will not note the fact if the number has been used 500 times in the past year. In 

the end, it was this shortcoming of Basic Pilot that permitted the company to utilize 

the system and still hire hundreds of illegal workers. This is the kind of charade 

that, unfortunately, characterizes much of our current immigration policy. 

THE STRIVE ACT OF 2007 EMPLOYMENT VERIFICATION APPROACH

More than two decades since IRCA, the song remains the same: the true key to 

enforcing our immigration laws will involve worksite enforcement. As trite as it 

sounds, those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it. As part of a comprehensive approach to immigration reform, the STRIVE Act of 2007 takes note of the lesVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:02 Jul 24, 2007 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00034 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 H:\WORK\IMMIG\042607\34927.000 HJUD1 PsN: DOUGA
31

sons learned through past attempts and would provide the crucial employment 

verification system that is enforceable and prevents against ID fraud. 

The legislation introduced by Congressman Gutierrez and I would create a mandatory system for employers to electronically verify workers’ employment authorization. It also establishes criminal penalties for employers and workers who operate 

outside the system and implements strong enforcement mechanisms. 

The Employment Eligibility Verification System, or EEVS, mandates the Homeland Security Department and Social Security Administration to develop a mandatory system for employers to verify the employment authorization of all new workers 

electronically or telephonically and establishes an interim verification regime for 

employers to use while the system is under development. The system would be 

gradually phased in over time, starting with critical infrastructure employers, followed by other employers based on size: largest employers would be required to use 

the system first, with smaller employers following in successive years. 

Importantly, the legislation limits the number of documents that an employer can 

accept in order to verify a worker’s eligibility to work. It follows the lead of legislation introduced by Congressman Dreier, in mandating an improved, biometric, tamper-resistant and machine-readable Social Security card. It is important to note that 

these provisions will not create a new secure National ID, but rather will prevent 

identify fraud exclusively in an employment verification setting. 

In addition to the secure Social Security card, other documents that could be presented to prove work authorization include a United States passport, a REAL IDcompliant driver’s license, a permanent resident card, and a secure card that the 

Secretary of Homeland Security could create to indicate work authorization. This is 

a vast improvement over the vast alphabet soup of documents that employers must 

currently accept from workers and try to verify as authentic. 

The mandatory EEVS system would establish a secure and responsive system 

that would provide a safe harbor for employers to ensure that the workers they are 

hiring are legally present in the U.S. The new System will use a cross-agency, crossplatform system to share immigration and Social Security information necessary to 

verify an individual’s work authorization. The System will not only determine if an 

individual’s name matches a Social Security number on file, but also whether the 

person standing before the employer does, in fact, bear the name and number that 

they’ve presented to the employer. 

A key component of the EEVS system is the creation of new and significant penalties for those workers and employers operating outside of the system. Scofflaw employers would be fined on a sliding scale for hiring unauthorized workers. This 

would entail fines of between $500 and $4,000 for each unauthorized worker for 

first-time wrongdoers, but quickly escalate to $20,000 for each unauthorized worker 

for repeat offenders. Concurrently, employers who do not follow the rules for recordkeeping or verification practices would face fines of up to $6,000 for repeat offenders. These employers could also face prison sentences of up to three years. Repeat 

violators would also be barred from federal contracts for five years. 

Madam Chairwoman, in conclusion, I would like to emphasize how crucial I believe the issue of employment eligibility verification is to the success of the broader 

comprehensive immigration reform. Giving employers the tools they need to determine if their workforce is legal will eliminate any excuse they currently have to fall 

foul of the law. Ensuring that those employers who choose to disobey the law will 

be held accountable will give the American people confidence that the days of lax 

enforcement are over and a new temporary worker program can be competently implemented and enforced.

Ms. LOFGREN. Well, thank you very much. 

What a distinguished panel this is, and we are so grateful that 

you took the time to be with us. 

We have questions, but we, as much as anyone, understand your 

schedule. I mean, we have the Chairman of the Intelligence Committee, the Ranking Member of the Rules Committee, just as examples. So if any of you need to leave before we ask questions, we will 

respect that and understand it. Those of you who can stay, we also 

very much appreciate that. 

So if you need to leave, you may. 

Mr. DREIER. We are here for the long haul. 

Ms. LOFGREN. On for the long haul. Then we will go to questions, 

and I am going to begin. 

32

My question reflects the testimony we will receive from the Cato 

Institute later this morning. I think all of us, and I include myself, 

have talked about the need for an employment verification system. 

We feel that we have Basic Pilot, we are looking at ways to improve it, whether we rename it or whatever. And your testimony 

has been very helpful and very on target. 

But when you are in a mode like that, I always think it is important to listen to the voices that are saying, ‘‘Wait a minute,’’ and 

address those issues. And one of the things that our Cato witness 

has pointed out is that when you have information sent to Social 

Security and the Department of Homeland Security, that information becomes, I am quoting from his testimony, ‘‘Very easy for those 

entities to access, copy, or use. It is likely combined with metadata 

information about what information was collected from whom and 

so on. And can then be correlated with information at the IRS or 

educational loan department, health records,’’ and on and on. 

And the witness goes on to say, ‘‘Unless there is a clear, strong, 

verifiable data destruction policy in place, any electronic employment verification system will be a surveillance system, however benign in its inception, that observes all American workers.’’

And I think as the testimony concludes, the old saw is true, 

again, this is a quote from the testimony: ‘‘Information is power. 

Uniform government ID systems have important consequences in 

terms of the individual’s relationship to government. A major concern with national IDs is the power that the identification gives to 

government,’’ and that the lesson that the witness hopes we will 

take is to ‘‘design a system that uses one key to control access to 

our intangible lives, our finances, communications, health care and 

so on, is a risk to our freedom and privacy,’’ to summarize. 

These are issues that all of us care about. That is not new. 

Any comments on these concerns? And if they are real concerns 

and we still do have a need to verify, what do we do about that 

concern? What protections do we build in or should we worry about 

it? Anyone who wants to answer? 

Ken? 

Mr. CALVERT. I think we all agree that a verification system is 

needed in the United States and any verification system, obviously, 

by its own definition, imposes some problems with privacy. 

However, that is a reasonable tradeoff in order to make sure that 

people that come into this country are coming here legally and 

working legally. 

A system similar to the Basic Pilot program, whether or not we 

come up with a way to make it counterfeit proof, is, I think, the 

best program, the most nondiscriminatory program, because it 

checks the document itself, to ensure that the people who come 

here have a legitimacy to come into the work force. 

I was in the restaurant business also. I had a number of restaurants. And it was—when I was an employer, it was impossible 

when we filed the I-9 form to check to see whether people were 

here legally or not. I went through the system, filed the I-9 form, 

put the several identifications on the back of the form and complied 

with the law. 

33

However, I knew because I could not ask nor could I look into 

the background of individuals that I hired, that some probably 

were here illegally. 

So a system such as this is necessary and I think that we are 

all on the same path, and I think it is necessary to impose this system and allow employers to check the veracity of the documents 

and the people they employ. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Anyone else? 

Mr. DREIER. Yes, Madam Chair. 

First of all, let me just say that I think Ken Calvert brings tremendous perspective from his experience as a restauranteur, and 

I am strongly supportive obviously of his Pilot program. And I appreciate the fact that my friends Luis Gutierrez and Jeff Flake 

have included H.R. 98 as part of STRIVE. 

James Madison, in ‘‘Federalist 51,’’ talked about the need for us 

to make sure that Government gets control of itself. And the fact 

of the matter is that I describe myself as a small ‘‘L’’ libertarian 

Republican. I echo and regularly talk about every one of those concerns that the Cato witness has brought forward because I believe 

that the notion of having the Government get too much information 

is something that I find absolutely abhorrent. 

We obviously have had some sacrifices that have had to be made. 

We all have recognized that since September 11 of 2001. That is 

one of the reasons I have been very particular and careful in 

crafting this legislation to ensure that the Government doesn’t get 

any new information that it doesn’t already have. 

Now, the Cato witness has talked about the potential for the 

sharing of information and the leaking of that information, which 

I think is a very, very valid concern. That is why in H.R. 98 I have 

included very, very harsh penalties for any of the activity that has 

been described there, and I too am concerned, as I said in my opening remarks, about the prospect of some kind of national ID card. 

I know there are some people who have opposed it in the past but 

are now supportive of that notion. 

But it is absolutely right and the Cato witness is absolutely right 

in talking about the need to ensure that we don’t have a national 

ID card, number one, and, number two, that we don’t see the Internal Revenue Service gaining access to information that they should 

not have access to. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you very much. 

I am almost up, but I don’t want to cut you off, Mr. Flake. 

Mr. FLAKE. Let me just briefly say, in our legislation we are cognizant of that risk, so we actually have four different, maybe five 

different pieces that can be used as secure documentation. They 

just all have to be machine readable, tamperproof, and so you won’t 

have one national ID out there. It can be the secure ID, passport, 

an identification card that DHS wants to come up with, but there 

won’t be just one piece. So that is a valid concern. 

Mr. GUTIERREZ. I am going to punt this right back. 

Madam Chairwoman, with you and Mr. Conyers, I can just—Berman, Jackson Lee, Waters, Meehan, Delahunt. I am confident that 

if the Committee does its work, we are going to put those protections in there. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you very much. 

34

And thank you, Mr. Ranking Member, for your indulgence in my 

going over. 

Mr. DREIER. Could I just say one quick thing, if I could, Madam 

Chair? 

Ms. LOFGREN. Certainly. 

Mr. DREIER. And that is, to Jeff’s point, I think it is important 

for us to know, one of the concerns that I have had about other documents is that they create the potential for discrimination, and 

that is why the utilization of the Social Security card really eliminates that. And the reason I say that is, you hear, well, you know, 

we will have a card for the guest workers who are here, a special 

card for the guest workers. 

Well, how do you ask? You look at someone and you say, well, 

is this a guest worker or is this an American citizen? I find that 

appalling, and that is why I think the Social Security card, which 

would mean that anyone in the labor force looking for a new job 

would be required to have that one document, and that is why I 

think that that is the way for us to go. 

Thank you very much. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you. 

Mr. King? 

Mr. KING. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

At first, I would note that Mr. Dreier quoted from ‘‘Federalist 51’’ 

and then he said, ‘‘Too much information is something that I find 

absolutely abhorrent.’’

I find your brain is full of all kinds of information, Mr. Dreier, 

none of which is abhorrent to me. I wanted to make that remark. 

Mr. DREIER. I have some, I bet, that you would. 

Mr. KING. I would like to first turn to Mr. Calvert. 

Before Basic Pilot was implemented, was there any way that the 

employer could verify that the name on the I-9 form actually 

matched the name that matched the Social Security number that 

was presented? 

Mr. CALVERT. No. There was no system available to an employer 

to check the veracity of the documents that were being used. 

Mr. KING. And now can—does an employer know if they run the 

Basic Pilot that that name matches the Social Security number and 

the identity to that number? 

Mr. CALVERT. Yes. The system works not perfectly but pretty 

well. And the statistics that you used earlier, way over 90 percent 

of the time you can check the veracity and effect of the document 

that is being used or the person that is applying for work. 

Mr. KING. But if it is a ‘‘no match,’’ on those names, if they give 

you the wrong name but a good Social Security number, you get 

a non-confirmation? 

Mr. CALVERT. That is correct. 

Mr. KING. And then the applicant gets time to cleanup their 

records. 

Mr. CALVERT. To cleanup their records, to check to find out if 

there is a problem within the Social Security Administration. 

Mr. KING. And we are always going to have problems when we 

go into a huge database, 300 million people in this country. And 

I want to submit this proposal or just a philosophy and ask you to 

respond to it, and that is, if we had a database that wasn’t 100 perVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:02 Jul 24, 2007 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00038 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 H:\WORK\IMMIG\042607\34927.000 HJUD1 PsN: DOUGA
35

cent clean, which obviously every database has some problems in 

it, I am looking at it from the standpoint of using it cleans up those 

records, because that is the only way you can really get it cleaned 

up, is to use it. 

Mr. CALVERT. Well, I would point out, when we started down this 

path back in 1997, we had tremendous amount of problems getting 

this thing rolling. I started out with a number of States. It started 

out, if you will remember, the folks that were involved in this, 

seven States, and then we rolled it all 50 States. And we had problems all the way along the way. 

So the Social Security Administration, Homeland Security, others, have now involved themselves in this, and have worked their 

way through a lot of these problems. Certainly, what happened 

with Swift is unfortunate, but I would like to point out that 50 employers a day sign MOUs to get onto the Basic Pilot program. This 

program will double in the next year. We have several large employers, I mean by large mega-employers that are looking on putting this program on voluntarily. 

So it is a system that works and it is a system that employers 

want to use. 

Mr. KING. This Basic Pilot goes out to a pair of databases, Social 

Security Administration, DHS. And in DHS it has the FBI database, NCIC, National Crime Information Center database. Do you 

know of any instances where that information went to an NCIC 

database and there were wants and warrants out there on an individual that was perhaps sitting in the HR office of a prospective 

employer? Has that done anything to pick up any of the people on 

the streets, even on the Top 10 Wanted List? 

Mr. CALVERT. I don’t know of that being used in the system. I 

have primarily been focused on employment verification. 

Mr. KING. Would you be for or against utilization of that to help 

make our system cleaner? 

Mr. CALVERT. Well, certainly, looking at it, the problem is that 

anytime you start expanding the basic system, which what we are 

trying to accomplish here is whether or not people are eligible for 

employment, it becomes in fact more complicated, more difficult. 

But it is, you know, I guess we could take a look at that, but that 

is what would occur. 

Mr. KING. Thank you, Mr. Calvert. 

Mr. Dreier, when one presents the magnetic stripe on the Social 

Security card that you have presented here today, how does an employer verify that that actually matches the biology of the person 

whom it was submitted to? 

Mr. DREIER. Because the way this works is that there is a photo 

imbedded on the card, and the card that is provided has the number. They swipe that card and it goes into the databank, the DHS 

databank, which would simply give a yes or no as to whether or 

not this is in fact a qualified worker. 

So there is a photo embedded on that card. And that is the end. 

The natural question is, well, we are all issued these cards when 

we are kids. The photograph is taken once one enters the labor 

force, the workforce, so that you don’t have a baby picture on there. 

Mr. KING. I have seen some of these congressional pictures, 

though, and I can’t recognize the people on the card. 

36

Mr. DREIER. Yes. That looks like my staff member has got his 

baby picture on there, and it was taken last week, so——

Mr. KING. Would there be a requirement to update that picture, 

say——

Mr. DREIER. That would obviously be something that would have 

to be addressed, because as you said, a lot of people have pictures 

in which they look a lot younger than they are. 

And the whole process would be phased in. Again, this is one of 

the arguments that has been given against this, talking about the 

fact that there may be 40 million of these needed because there are 

40 million people who are changing jobs on an annual basis, and 

that is one of the things that has led a number of people to oppose 

this. 

But, you know, obviously there is going to be a cost to anything 

that we are going to do, and I think that if you look again at these 

multifarious documents that are provided, to get down to one, because there has been no attempt whatsoever to update since 1935 

this card. I think that this is really the single best route for us to 

take on this. 

Mr. KING. Thank you, Mr. Dreier. 

If I could, just a quick question of Mr. Flake. 

The issue that I raised with regard to using the Basic Pilot program and when that search goes through the database of DHS, 

FBI, NCIC, down through there, would you be supportive of using 

that for law enforcement so that if we are going to run all these 

databases, we can pick some of these people up off the street? 

And then in conjunction with that question, we have employers 

that are deducting billions of dollars in expenses that are being 

paid to illegal employees, illegal wages. Would you support using 

that also to ask the IRS to deny the deductibility of wages and benefits paid to illegals? 

Mr. FLAKE. I want to be sensitive to any unfunded mandates 

that we are passing on to people at the local level or businesses 

that may not have the tools to do it. But to the extent—I mean, 

our legislation, what we are trying to do in this is to make sure 

that we have interagency cooperation, that we can—obviously, 

these databases that we are going to be using, when you have a 

biometric, can be used by law enforcement agencies and everything 

else. So that is really the ultimate goal of where we are going. 

At the present time, I just don’t know what kind of mandates or 

costs would be borne by the local entities, so I am not sure. 

Mr. KING. Thank you, Mr. Flake. 

Ma’am, I yield back. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you, Mr. King. 

I would now recognize our Chairman, Mr. Conyers for his 5 minutes of questions. 

Mr. CONYERS. Jeff Flake, I commend you and Luis for the antidiscrimination provision that is in your electronic employer 

verification system. I think it is very important. 

But why was Javier Rodriguez, on Amy Goodman’s program, so 

critical of this bill that you two are proposing when—and he suggested it is corporate sponsored or corporate favored. Is President 

Bush with us? Or to what extent—I know we talked about him 

being there, but I need to know what that really means. 

37

And my dear former Chairman, you know, calling a national 

ID—it is not a national ID card. It is not a national ID card. But 

you know the problem you are going to have, they are going to say 

it is an ID card. 

Mr. DREIER. No. They have been. 

Mr. CONYERS. They may have already started. I really don’t 

know. 

And, finally, back to Jeff Flake, how do we get to balanced enforcement for treatment of employer? Safe harbor may be a nice 

way, a cozy way, of helping them out, but then we don’t want to 

hang them out like Swift was hung out to dry for cooperating. 

So I leave this for all of you to help me unravel. And I know we 

are going to be seeing each other, so the world doesn’t end when 

my 5 minutes ends. We are going to be talking a lot about this. 

Mr. FLAKE. Let me just say, to answer the first, I can’t speak for 

the President on this. I know the President has been supportive 

consistently of comprehensive reform. As far as the details of our 

legislation, our legislation as a whole, he has not come out and 

taken a position on it. But I know and appreciate that he has been 

consistently in favor of comprehensive reform, including employer 

verification. 

With regard to the second point, as far as equal enforcement, I 

have always felt that we need better enforcement, more severe enforcement, and that is why our legislation increases the penalties 

on employers if they knowingly violate immigration law. But they 

have got to have the tools. And that is the balance that I think that 

you are referring to. 

Heretofore, employers haven’t had all the tools even though there 

have been some tools out there. They still—they are imperfect or 

incomplete tools right now. 

Mr. CALVERT. Mr. Chairman, I might point out, bringing it to 

Swift, that was an extremely unfortunately situation. But I would 

point out that this program is not perfect, but I would challenge 

anyone here to find a Government program that is perfect. But it 

is the only system out there today. And for the whole, the great 

majority, well over 90 percent, it is working to verify documents 

that are used for employment. 

As far as the issue of discrimination, this program, the Basic 

Pilot program, was never intended to be a prescreening program to 

discriminate against potential employees, and the current program 

is developing and monitoring a compliance office to detect and follow-up on these fraudulent and other misuse of the systems and 

with instances of employers not following program procedures. 

I want to point out that under the 1986 Simpson-Mazzoli Bill, 

there were significant fines in the bill that could be imposed by the 

immigration folks if in fact an employer knowingly hired somebody 

illegally. However, there was no system until the Basic Pilot program came on, for the employer to verify whether or not the documents that were being used were legitimate. So today it is the only 

system that is available. 

Mr. CONYERS. But what about the small business people in your 

Basic Pilot program? There has got to be some financial incentives. 

The moms and pops aren’t going to be able to afford your plan. 

38

Mr. CALVERT. Well, I would—I was a small businessman, relatively a small businessman. And I wanted to do the right thing. 

Most small businesspeople I know across America, when I go back 

home, are absolutely in favor of the Basic Pilot program, and it is 

proven by the fact that the program is literally doubling every 

year. 

Thousands and thousands of small employers are signing up to 

get on the Basic Pilot program. Small restaurateurs, small drycleaners, businesses all across America. 

Mr. DREIER. Let me just say that our 5 minutes has ended, but 

I am glad that the Chairman has indicated that life will go on beyond the 5 minutes, and I will just say very quickly that I think 

that on this notion of a national ID card, my idea is that the Social 

Security card is thrown into your desk drawer. You only use it 

when you are applying for a new job, and that is the only use that 

is going to be out there for it. 

Mr. CONYERS. Thank you, all. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you. 

And as noted, the Chairman of the full Committee has been very 

engaged in this process, which is a wonderful phenomena. 

Before recognizing the gentlelady Ms. Jackson Lee, I would like 

to note that the former Chairman of the Immigration Subcommittee, former Congressman Bruce Morrison, is here, and he is 

associated with the Society for Human Resource Management, who 

has a statement that, by unanimous consent, will be made a part 

of our record. 

I would now recognize the gentlelady from Texas, Ms. Jackson 

Lee, for 5 minutes. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Thank you very much. 

I do appreciate the series of hearings that we are having and 

look forward to being able to discuss a multitude of legislative initiatives, which could include the Save America Comprehensive Immigration Reform Bill that I have authored for a number of years, 

and I believe that combined with trying to fix some of the missteps 

of 1986 and 1996, I think amongst the witnesses today we have a 

broad range of options and opportunities to take this issue very seriously. 

Let me just acknowledge that I have young Claudia Ocampo with 

me today from Arlington, Texas, and she is with Girls, Inc. We are 

very proud of her. And I will just simply say that she has an immigrant background, but her family are contributing, and we are excited that she is here with us today. 

I think that is the tone in which I want to utilize my time; as 

a backdrop of how we fix the immigration system. I think we need 

to start from the premise that we have individuals who want to 

contribute to society. We have individuals who are contributing to 

society. And we have got to find a way that balances privacy, due 

process—those are some issues that I am very concerned about, the 

nondiscriminatory practices against employees and enforcement. 

Yesterday, I think, and I don’t know, Madam Chairwoman, the 

days are running together. I think we were in a hearing either yesterday or the day before, and I asked the representative from Swift, 

‘‘Did you come to this hearing to complain about your treatment?’’

39

And he was forthright. ‘‘Absolutely not. But can you tell us what 

the law is, because we would like to comply with the law.’’

My Texas contractors who are looking for roofers and electricians 

and, of course, all of us say find Americans, and that is what I say 

to them, but they are looking for all of these skills and they say 

simply tell us the law. 

Mr. Dreier, you are talking about a card which I would just jump 

ahead and say, you know, on many occasions on the floor we have 

indicated that it is a national ID card. But if we are going to start 

afresh, let’s try to find out what it is. 

And my concerns would be, you can help me understand the safeguard provisions that would protect the privacy of the information 

that would be on the card. I have heard you previously say put it 

in the drawer, it is only supposed to be used for employment purposes. You know about theft. You know that people keep cards in 

their wallet more than they probably need to. 

And so what would be your take on how we would ensure the 

privacy and what non-immigration information do you think would 

be recorded on the card? 

And before you answer, let me just pose to Mr. Flake so he can 

be thinking about it, let’s get it right. And, frankly, I want to make 

it clear that I am not faulting ICE. They are doing their job. They 

need to have rules and regulations. But the raids that are going 

on create a massiveness of intimidation. I don’t know if they have 

been occuring in your district. You might want to comment on that. 

But I think I would like to hear from you as to what a constructive 

enforcement system would do to utilize ICE resources where they 

should be, where people are flagrantly, outwardly saying, ‘‘I am not 

even going to worry about the system.’’ You can think about that. 

Mr. Dreier? 

Mr. DREIER. Thank you very much, Ms. Jackson Lee. 

Before you came into the room, I actually had an exchange on 

this issue with Mr. King and with the distinguished Chair of the 

Subcommittee in which we were talking about the fact that there 

is understandable concern over the notion of any of this information being shared. That is one of the reasons that when the employer gets the information back, they don’t get the exact status of 

a person, whether or not they are a citizen or they are here on 

some kind of visa. They just get yes or no, in fact is this a qualified 

worker. 

And we do have very harsh penalties that we include in the legislation for anyone who is utilizing this information incorrectly 

As I said, I would be very troubled at the notion of the Internal 

Revenue Service gaining access to this kind of information that 

may be coming in. And so that is why we have been careful to 

make it clear that the Government is not going to be able to gain 

any new information. 

Now, I would also argue that if look at the fact that the flimsy 

little piece of paper that has been the Social Security card, Ms. 

Jackson Lee, since 1935, and no attempt whatsoever to update 

that, that having a smart, counterfeit-proof card would in fact play 

a role in diminishing the threat for duplication and fraudulent use 

of that card. So that is why I believe that this is indicated. 

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And, again, to Mr. Conyers’ very appropriate point on the issue 

of discrimination, this card prevents some other card being utilized 

and asking someone whether or not, you know, you have your 

guest worker card, and looking at someone and saying, well, that 

must be a guest worker. And that is why the Social Security card 

is an——

Ms. JACKSON LEE. But it wouldn’t have any extraneous information—extra information that would not be necessary. 

Mr. DREIER. Absolutely. You are absolutely right. 

Madam Chair—thank you, Mr. Dreier. 

May I let Mr. Flake answer on getting a system in——

Ms. LOFGREN. Certainly. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE [continuing]. So we can balance this raiding 

that is going on. 

Mr. FLAKE. I wish I had a good answer as to how these raids can 

be nondiscriminatory and effective and not catching other people in 

the net that shouldn’t be in the net. ICE struggles with that. So 

do local governments. 

In my district, the city of Chandler years ago had a type of 

roundup where they thought that they could check documents. In 

the end, they included in the net a lot of people that shouldn’t have 

been in the net. 

But I can’t see how ICE can simply not try to enforce current 

law. So we are in a horrible period right now, until we get the kind 

of identification that we are talking about. That is why it is so important that we move through and get comprehensive reform. It is 

a very good question. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. We need to fix the system. 

Mr. FLAKE. Yes. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Thank you. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you. 

The gentlelady from California, Ms. Sa ́nchez, is recognized for 5 

minutes. 

Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

I would just like the folks on our first panel to know that we appreciate the thoughtfulness with which you have tried to tackle 

this problem. 

Earlier in the week, we had another hearing in this Subcommittee dealing with the same issue. And Jonathan Scharfen, 

the deputy director of USCIS, was here to answer questions, and 

I asked him the same question that I am going to ask all of you, 

which is: my concern with the Basic Pilot program and extending 

this to all employers is what happens when employers misuse the 

system? And I am going to give you a few examples. 

Employers who may not enter somebody into the verification system until—and still hire them, still hire workers—and then later 

enter them into the system when, say, a labor complaint has been 

filed against the company. Or unauthorized employees having access to the employment verification system, not something that I 

would want to happen with my information. 

So I asked him, what kind of penalties exist for employers who 

misuse the system and how often does that happen and there 

weren’t any clear statistics and they really didn’t have an answer 

41

for what are the penalties for an employer who misuses the database. 

So I am going to ask each of you, how would you address that 

problem, of employers misusing the electronic employment 

verification system? 

Mr. DREIER. Let me just say that I am not here, Ms. Sa ́nchez, 

as an expert on the employer verification system. I am here arguing that the answer is for us to have a smart, counterfeit-proof Social Security card and the employer would get no information whatsoever other than is this person in fact a qualified worker. Meaning 

are they in this country legally. And that is the only thing that employers would have as information by utilizing the smart, counterfeit-proof Social Security card. 

Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. Mr. Flake, what is your response? 

Mr. FLAKE. That is a very good question and that has been a concern whenever we are dealing with this, as we talked about before, 

identification that people will construe as a national ID, we want 

to make sure that it is secure. And so we have specific mandates 

in terms of who can utilize that information within the company 

and then specific penalties if it is misused by others. So if you look 

in our legislation, there are safeguards there. It is an important 

point and one that we took seriously. 

Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. Okay. Just out of curiosity, what types of penalties 

do you envision? 

Mr. FLAKE. In terms of—I think they are roughly equivalent with 

the penalties that we have for basically hiring those who are illegal 

once you knowingly do it, which I think are $20,000 on the second 

occurrence, between $4,000 and $10,000 on the first. 

Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. Okay. I thank you. 

Mr. DREIER. Let me just say that on H.R. 98, we have a 400 percent increase in the penalty from $10,000 to $50,000 and a mandatory 5 years in prison for employers who are out there and who are 

knowingly hiring, and that is how we focus on the whole notion of 

enforcement so that we don’t see businesses out there abusing this. 

Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. Okay. But we are talking about——

Mr. DREIER [continuing]. Right, I know. 

Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. Because you are talking hiring. I am talking about 

misusing of the——

Mr. DREIER. Right. Right. I am talking about the hiring. 

Ms. SA ́ NCHEZ. I understand. Thank you very much, Mr. Dreier. 

I yield back. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Well, thank you very much. 

And thanks to the Members who have so generously given of 

their time. We know how busy you are. And your commitment of 

time shows us how committed you are to this issue and we appreciate it a great deal. 

I am going to ask that our second panel of distinguished witnesses come forward at this time. 

First, I am pleased to introduce Randel Johnson, who is Vice 

President of the Labor, Immigration and Employee Benefits at the 

United States Chamber of Commerce. Prior to joining the U.S. 

Chamber, Mr. Johnson worked as the labor counsel and coordinator 

for the Republican staff of the House Committee on Education and 

the Workforce and spent 6 years as an attorney with the U.S. DeVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:02 Jul 24, 2007 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00045 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 H:\WORK\IMMIG\042607\34927.000 HJUD1 PsN: DOUGA
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partment of Labor. He served as a member of several commissions 

concerning immigration, including the Department of Homeland 

Security Data Management Improvement Task Force, the 21st 

Century Workforce Commission, and the Carnegie U.S. Mexican 

Migration Study Group. Mr. Johnson holds degrees from Dennison 

University, the University of Maryland School of Law, and the 

Georgetown University Law Center. 

We are also pleased to have Robert Gibbs with us, a founding 

partner with the Seattle law firm of Gibbs Houston Pauw. Mr. 

Gibbs has specialized in immigration and employment law for over 

20 years, advising organizations spanning a host of different industries, from agriculture to construction to food processing. He addresses us today on behalf of the Service Employees International 

Union. Mr. Gibbs holds his law degree from the University of 

Washington Law School. 

We are also pleased to have Jim Harper with us, the Director of 

Information Policy Studies at the Cato Institute here in Washington. Mr. Harper has written extensively on the intersections between privacy concerns and modern data technology systems, and 

he serves as a member of the Department of Homeland Security’s 

data privacy and integrity advisory committee. Mr. Harper holds 

his JD from Hastings College of Law. 

Finally, I would like to welcome Jessica Vaughan, the senior policy analyst for the Center of Immigration Studies. Ms. Vaughan 

has worked for the Center since 1992, having developed her expertise in the Executive Branch’s implementation of immigration policy. Before joining the center, Ms. Vaughan worked as a Foreign 

Service Officer with the State Department. She earned her bachelor’s degree at Washington College in Maryland and master’s degree from Georgetown University. 

As you have heard, each of your written statements, which I 

have read and appreciate a great deal, will be made a part of the 

official record. We ask that you summarize your testimony in 5 

minutes. When the yellow light goes on there, that means you have 

a minute to go. And when the red light goes on, it means your time 

is up and we would ask that you summarize. 

So, if we could, we will begin with Mr. Johnson. 

TESTIMONY OF RANDEL JOHNSON, VICE PRESIDENT, LABOR, 

IMMIGRATION & EMPLOYEE BENEFITS, U.S. CHAMBER OF 

COMMERCE 

Mr. JOHNSON. Thank you, Chairwoman Lofgren and Ranking 

Member King. 

I think it was sort of gratifying to see the apparent consensus of 

the last panel in terms of what I think was comprehensive immigration reform, if I was hearing the Members correctly, and it certainly marks a change in the debate, I think, and is a hopeful indication of what we can get done in the House in the next several 

months. 

I am Randy Johnson, Vice President of Labor, Immigration and 

Employee Benefits at the U.S. Chamber. I do want to note that the 

Chamber also co-chairs the Essential Worker Immigration Coalition and separately the Employment Eligibility Verification Working Group. Both of these groups are very broadly based across inVerDate 0ct 09 2002 11:02 Jul 24, 2007 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00046 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 H:\WORK\IMMIG\042607\34927.000 HJUD1 PsN: DOUGA
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dustry sectors. They will be submitting separate statements, and I 

think much of what I will say today will be reflected in their statements, indicating that there is a general concern in many of the 

areas I will talk about today across industry. 

I do confess that when I went down to the Chamber as Vice 

President, I didn’t think I would be testifying in front of a panel 

here in the House in favor of a broad, sweeping mandate on employers. But here I am, and hopefully I will still have my job when 

I get back to the office. 

But I think the fact that the Chamber and other business groups 

are willing to step into a broadening mandate indicates how important we think it is to achieve comprehensive immigration reform. 

With that being said, while a lot of the press has been focused on 

temporary worker programs and the undocumented, I think there 

has been a lack of attention to title 3 and the employer verification 

system, which is why I think we so much appreciate the fact the 

Committee is holding this hearing today specifically on this issue. 

There has been a lot of discussion in prior hearings with regard 

to the degree of accuracy of the pilot program. We can debate that 

back and forth. I am not sure if it is 20 percent or 1 percent, frankly, and DHS won’t tell us. Hopefully they will tell us in the future 

and, more importantly, they will tell you. 

However, it is important to note that even with a 1 percent error 

rate, you are talking about disqualifying perhaps over 1 million 

Americans from their livelihood. Not a credit card transaction. We 

are talking about people losing their jobs, U.S. citizens and not just 

immigrants. So the stakes, I think, could not be higher, not just for 

the employer community but also for employees. And certainly 

none of us want to see a system rolled out that disqualifies U.S. 

citizens from jobs that they are properly authorized to work. 

And now, as I said, it is important from a business community 

standpoint that any rollout of a system is part of comprehensive 

immigration reform, and I know that has been noted by many others, so I won’t belabor it. But it is important that it is seen as part 

of a package. 

With regard to key elements, phase-ins, if those—and Congressman Calvert made a compelling case with regard to the pilot program today, with regard to its accuracy and its workability, and 

that is fine and that is great. Even he proposed a phase-in of 7 

years. But if the Department of Homeland Security and others 

have such a strong belief that this will work, surely they will not 

oppose a benchmark that tests the accuracy of the system as it 

rolls out. 

The business community has a jaundiced view of the ability of 

the Government to roll such a massive program out in the way it 

has been promised, but if it can be done, then surely those proponents won’t be afraid of solid benchmarks and so the program 

will be tested before it is rolled out to the next part. 

Secondly, we think it should be limited to new hires. We know 

that is controversial, but there are 140 million employees in the 

workforce today. Think of the burden on employers to reverify all 

of those employees. And given that there are 50 million to 60 million new hires every year just in a general turnover in the workforce, over time people will be reverified anyway. So we think no 

44

reverification of the existing workforce but certainly, obviously, 

new hires. 

Third, we think that the existing law with regard to the subcontractor-contractor relationship should be retained. That is a contractor should not be liable for the violation of a subcontractor absent, of course, knowing that the subcontractor is in fact violating 

the law. That is indefensible and it should remain so, but imputed 

knowledge of some sort, we think, is not a proper level of fault or 

liability. 

Obviously, we think—and this is where there is a contrast between realtime verification and testing, whether or not what the 

Government gives you is true, but employers do need a quick response and an accurate response when they put an employee’s 

name in there, and they need a final decision by the Government 

fairly quickly with regard to whether or not that person can be 

hired. We think 30 days is about right. Others think perhaps a 

longer time. 

Lastly, with regard to—two more things. With regard to fees, not 

surprisingly we don’t think the business community ought to have 

to support this system or pay for it. It is of general importance to 

this country and we think it should be funded generally by taxpayers and through the Government, normal appropriations, and 

not through fees imposed on the private sector. 

With regard to enforcement, we don’t think the debarment process has a role here. The debarment process is a separate issue with 

regard to enforcement of labor laws. Labor laws and immigration 

laws ought to be left to those in law enforcement and the debarment process should not be part of that. 

Preemption, we think we need sound preemption across the 

board of State laws in this area. And, lastly, we are concerned 

about parts of certain bills we see which appear to be sort of quiet 

ways to expand labor laws and push a labor agenda beyond immigration and for separate reasons we would oppose that, and we 

would hope this issue is limited to immigration issues and not a 

quiet way of pushing a labor agenda that has nothing to do with 

immigration. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Johnson follows:]

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PREPARED STATEMENT OF RANDEL K. JOHNSON


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Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you, Mr. Johnson. 

Mr. Gibbs? 

TESTIMONY OF ROBERT GIBBS, PARTNER, GIBBS HOUSTON 

PAUW, ON BEHALF OF THE SERVICE EMPLOYEES INTERNATIONAL UNION 

Mr. GIBBS. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman and Ranking Member King and other Members of the Committee. 

I am most pleased to be here and hear this discussion this morning, particularly, as Mr. Johnson mentioned, the emphasis on comprehensive reform, which is of strong interest to the Service Employees International Union. 

The Service Employees Union has extensive experience assisting 

its members in dealing with the kinds of problems that employers 

face in verifying the authorization of employees for work. Because 

of that and because of the problems that we see with discrimination in existing systems and with inaccuracies in Social Security 

and Immigration Service records, we are particularly concerned 

that this Committee makes sure that anything that is done in this 

regards gives a system that is right, particularly as we talk about 

expanding the program from a system that only involves less than 

1 percent of the employers in this country to one that would involve 8 million employers and 160 million workers. You are talking 

about a massive problem if we make even small errors and small 

missteps in the process of construction an electronic verification 

system. 

For a verification system to work, it must accurately identify 

those who are qualified for employment while providing a workable 

means for needed workers to timely obtain documentation of their 

authorization to work. 

For the first tie, this kind of program would provide to the Government the power to order employers to terminate workers. And 

if we are expanding that to every employer/every employee, it is a 

massive expansion of a Government program. 

What does this mean to each of us, to the Members of the Committee? The testimony here this week from Citizenship and Immigration Services was that under the Basic Pilot program, 8 percent 

are erroneously non-confirmed, at least at a preliminary basis, of 

all workers. Not just immigrant workers but citizen workers, everybody who is verified, it is an 8 percent error rate. 

One may think 8 percent, that is not too bad. Eight percent of 

the workers in your district is 24,000 workers; 24,000 workers coming into your district offices, asking your staff for help is a lot of 

work and a lot of problem for your staff to deal with. That is why 

it is so critical that we get this right. Unless these errors are cured, 

there are going to be major problems in your offices and for the 

families in our districts who are losing their jobs and trying to figure out how to support their families. 

Proposals to require employers to electronically utilize a Government verification program will only succeed if it is part of a program of comprehensive reform. Why is that the case? It is not just 

because we want comprehensive reform. But unless you shrink the 

size of the problem down to something that is manageable, this 

program will collapse of its own weight. 

56

There has to be both a program to remedy the 7 million to 12 

million unauthorized worker situations here in a broad way and 

not a narrow program that only fixes half of those people, plus a 

program for future immigration worker flows so that we are not 

back here 10 years from now dealing with a problem that we 

haven’t cured in 2007. 

It is only if those workers—only if there is not both the supply 

of undocumented workers there who are attractive to employers 

who would like to use their work without having to pay competitive 

wages and decent working conditions, does an electronic 

verification system have a chance to work. If there is a major supply of workers and a labor market that demands the use of those 

workers, some employers will find ways to get around whatever 

system this Committee devises. 

What we saw with the creation of the Immigration Reform and 

Control Act’s employer sanctions in 1986, which created the I-9 

form and required employers to verify every employee by the employee’s presenting documents was that the employer filled out the 

I-9 form and the employee presented the document. Unfortunately, 

some number of those employees presented made up documents. 

They made up a name, they made up a Social Security number and 

they presented it. 

Now what we are getting, as we try to tighten the system, is that 

we get rather than completely made up documents which don’t injure some real person, we are starting to see the kind of situation 

that happened at Swift, where employees then have to find a legitimate name and a legitimate Social Security number and birth date 

to use to generate documents which will clear the Basic Pilot program. 

So as we tighten the system you get a response, and the response 

is identity fraud problems. If we want to roll that out on a national 

basis, we would better figure out how we are going to keep that 

from happening at the same time, but there are other consequences, then, that flow from trying to tighten up the identity 

fraud problem. 

There are several things that we think need some fixing in the 

various bills for employment verification. We think that the efforts 

to limit the number of documents have gone too far. There are too 

few documents in the most recent proposal. In other words, the 

pendulum has swung way too far the other direction. 

Why is this a problem? Well, there are several reasons. One is, 

the passport, which only 25 percent of U.S. workers have, is a very 

expensive and increasingly time-consuming process to get. The 

Real ID, five States have bowed out of that. Homeland Security 

only accepts a very few number of documents, charges a lot of 

money and takes a lot of time to generate them. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Gibbs, your time is——

Mr. GIBBS. I will wind up and respond to questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Gibbs follows:]

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PREPARED STATEMENT OF ROBERT H. GIBBS


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Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you very much. 

Mr. Harper? 

TESTIMONY OF JIM HARPER, DIRECTOR OF INFORMATION 

POLICY STUDIES, THE CATO INSTITUTE 

Mr. HARPER. Thank you very much, Madam Chair. 

I feel like I have to confess, I should maybe be docked a couple 

of minutes because your question came out of my testimony. I 

won’t volunteer to be docked those minutes, but thank you for asking that question. I appreciate you focusing on those issues because 

I do think they are very important. 

Congratulations and thank you very much for conducting extensive hearings on the immigration reform issue, and particularly 

this issue. It is a pleasure to me to see broad agreement on comprehensive immigration reform, and I want to make a blanket 

statement that if I don’t repeat enough may hold: that I understand and accept entirely the good faith, the good intentions, and 

sincerity of everybody who testified before you on this panel and 

everybody on this Committee to try to solve difficult problems and 

come up with some solutions. 

I sometimes relish being the skunk at the garden party. I don’t 

in this case. But I do want to highlight some very serious concerns 

about the expansion of Basic Pilot and electronic employment 

verification generally. 

There really are formidable problems with creating a workable 

and acceptable employment verification system for Federal immigration law enforcement. A nationwide system for checking identity 

and eligibility is much more easily said than done. 

It is not surprising, of course, that there is a push to improve the 

current system. There are a lot of problems with it. I think we 

should have a marker that it is more important that American citizens and eligible people should be able to work than it is to exclude 

illegal aliens from working, the discrimination issue we have heard 

about so much already. 

The theory of using employment eligibility to reduce the power 

of the U.S. economic magnet makes logical sense. But it is very difficult to prove work eligibility under IRCA on a mass scale. The 

credential that we are talking about, eligibility, is a personal one; 

that is, it attaches to an individual and is nontransferable. 

So the process requires two steps: identification and determination of that eligibility. Frankly, I don’t know how you get away 

from identification, a mass identification system, which could probably be characterized accurately as a national identification system. 

As to ID, as to the system now, we use identification in our personal transactions all the time. We are built to do that with our 

eyes and ears to recognize other people. And so we very often rely 

on identification as a bulletproof way of getting things done. 

But remote identification, identification of strangers, identification using cards, is a different process. It is a process that is much 

more open to fraud in various dimensions of it, and that is why the 

current I-9 system doesn’t work very well. 

At the outset of an employment relationship, particularly in the 

low-skill areas, employers really don’t know their employees from 

70

Adam, so they have to accept documents that are often fraudulent. 

They are not in a good position to verify the accuracy or the tamper-resistance of the documents they are looking at. 

I think that moving to an electronic verification system would reduce illegal working somewhat by creating a simple sort of background check, checking to see if this name and Social Security pair 

exists, is paired also in the Social Security system databases. You 

could do rough logic checks, as was discussed. See if a Social Security name pair had been used before several times in succession. 

That would give you some suggestion that fraudulent documents 

were being used. 

But what exactly you do with that information is very difficult, 

because you would be just as likely to take the honest, law-abiding 

worker and make them a tentative non-confirmation as you would 

the fraudulent worker. 

The system would create a great demand, because of its toughness, would create a great demand for additional identity fraud, 

that is to get new, unused name and Social Security pairs. So there 

would be a lot more demand for that information. It would come 

from the law-abiding citizens and the data would be stolen lots of 

different places. We know about the data breaches that have happened in the public and private sectors. 

The response is a secure card. I don’t know how you do it without 

making it a biometric card, and I do think that in fairness it would 

have to be some kind of national ID system. 

There are very, very advanced technical ways that you could create a biometric credential that doesn’t share any other information, 

but that is a couple generations down the road. It is possible, but 

I don’t see it happening in the very near future. 

You brought up some of the privacy concerns, and I very much 

appreciate that. An electronic system is different in kind, not degree, from a paper-based system. When an employer puts an I-9 

form in a file, that is one thing. When the information is submitted 

to the Government electronically, that is a very, very different 

thing. And the information can be collected, stored, and used. I appreciate the good faith of law writers saying we do not want it 

used, we do not want it converted to other uses. But you know the 

Social Security number was supposed to be for operating the Social 

Security system, and we know well that we are well beyond that 

date. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Harper, I am not docking you your time, but 

I am going to keep you to 5 minutes——

Mr. HARPER. Very well. 

Ms. LOFGREN [continuing]. As we have a vote coming up on the 

floor soon. 

Mr. HARPER. I do appreciate the consensus on broad reform. And 

thank you for hearing me. 

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Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you. 

Ms. Vaughan, your 5 minutes. 

TESTIMONY OF JESSICA VAUGHAN, SENIOR POLICY ANALYST, 

CENTER FOR IMMIGRATION STUDIES 

Ms. VAUGHAN. Thank you, Ms. Lofgren and Mr. King, for the opportunity to testify this morning. 

My view is that the electronic employment verification system 

works very well and we are accomplishing the two goals of helping 

employers avoid hiring illegal workers and making it harder for illegal workers to deceive their employers. 

Congress does not need to make changes to the way the system 

operates or how it processes queries as has been proposed in the 

STRIVE Act. After 10 years of tests, evaluations and improvements, we know that it works. It is an efficient system. It has safeguards to prevent wrongful termination and discrimination and 

employers report that it is easier to use than the existing I-9 paperwork system and brings no disruption to the company or to 

legal workers. 

The system is working well, but it is not perfect. The biggest 

problem with EEV is that it is still voluntary. Those employers who 

wish to excuse themselves from the law can choose not to participate. Not only is this unfair, it means the program is not nearly 

as effective as it could be in preventing illegal employment. 

Companies who must compete with scofflaws are at a disadvantage. Congress has a responsibility to ensure that conscientious employers who perform their due diligence in hiring are not put at a 

disadvantage for doing so. The most obvious way to do this is to 

phase in mandatory participation in EEV, ideally starting with industries that have historically attracted large numbers of illegal 

workers. 

If the program were to be made mandatory tomorrow, most businesses would be able to comply. Even most small businesses already use the Internet and can access the system. Companies who 

don’t want to do it themselves can pay their own accountants or 

lawyers or hire one of the more than 300 private sector designated 

agents to verify workers for them. 

If the EEV program is made mandatory, it is important that certain processes that have been honed over the 10-year pilot phase 

be preserved. For example, the current practice is to do the manual 

confirmations that are more costly and time consuming only when 

an employee contests a tentative non-confirmation result. 

Those who do not contest are assumed to be ineligible and the 

agencies don’t have to spend anymore time on them. This selfweeding feature will be even more important as the volume of queries increases. 

The STRIVE Act, on the other hand, requires that manual 

verification be done even before determining if an employee is 

going to contest a tentative non-confirmation. That is going to be 

wasteful. And the verification office would quickly be bogged down 

trying to verify however many thousands of unverifiable cases are 

turned up. 

The other major issue that has to be addressed, of course, to improve the system is identity fraud. While this is a vulnerability, it 

89

is not a fatal flaw, and a number of options exist to overcome the 

system’s limitation. 

First, Congress should support the USCIS plan to develop a monitoring and compliance unit in the verification office by providing 

resources for staff and technology. And in addition to electronic 

monitoring, the unit should institute a through on-site audit process to check both paperwork and employees. It should be done on 

both a random basis and also to follow-up on leads generated by 

monitoring the queries that go through. And the Social Security 

Administration should be directed to routinely share information 

with DHS on possible immigration violations. 

There are other ways for companies to pick up on this kind of 

fraud on their own. For almost 2 years, the Social Security Administration has offered an electronic verification service called 

SSNVS. So employers can monitor their payrolls, and we are talking about current employees, not just new hires, and they can detect discrepancies between the company records and the Social Security record. 

Nearly 20,000 employers used it last year to verify more than 25 

million employees, making this program even bigger than Basic 

Pilot. Arizona has been doing SSNVS audits for more than a year 

and the State of North Carolina considers it a best practice and insists that their State employers do it on a quarterly basis. If Swift 

& Company had made use of this tool, it might have been spared 

the big disruption that was caused when ICE raided its worksites 

at the end of last year. 

Congress should consider requiring all employers of a certain size 

to perform regular SSNVS audits as an alternative to retroactive 

EEV screening. 

Some have proposed that the identity fraud issue be addressed 

through the creation of a biometric work identification card. While 

this might be a desirable goal for the future and definitely deserves 

further study, I don’t see how it will help improve the existing 

verification system. 

Besides the cost of developing the program, even if every legal 

worker had a biometric card to prove it, very few if any employers 

have the capability to authenticate the identity of job applicants. 

While plenty of barber shops, snowball stands, and gas stations use 

the Internet on a regular basis, it is not realistic to expect them 

to acquire fingerprint readers or retina scanners or that type of 

equipment at this point in time, and it is not fair to expect communities around the Nation that are shouldering the burden of illegal 

immigration to wait until that kind of technology becomes affordable and available before they see serious immigration law enforcement. 

Finally, there must be a more vigorous worksite enforcement effort from ICE to address off-the-books employment. 

Thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Vaughan follows:]

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PREPARED STATEMENT OF JESSICA M. VAUGHAN


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Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you, Ms. Vaughan. Thank you for summarizing. 

I am going to be quick because we are expecting a vote within 

the next 10 minutes on the floor that will consume 40 minutes or 

so. 

I will just say that in terms of assuming that those that do not 

adequately contest are not eligible, I think would be a mistake, and 

I am going to give an example, because she has given me her permission, which is the Counsel for this Subcommittee. 

Ms. Hong has been a United States citizen for over 15 years, and 

the Congress participates in the Basic Pilot. Even though she had 

her United States passport, it came back not eligible. And Ms. 

Hong, it took her 7 days, three trips to the Social Security office, 

three trips to the House employment office, three trips to the Judiciary Committee. She is an immigration lawyer, her boss is the 

Chair of the Immigration Subcommittee. She was successful in getting this straightened out. 

But I am mindful that there are people who are not immigration 

lawyers, whose boss is not the Immigration Subcommittee Chair, 

who might actually give up, and they would still be United States 

citizens. So I think we need a better system than just to assume 

that if you fail it is okay. 

I just would like to say and ask this question I guess of whoever 

can answer it, maybe to Mr. Harper. First, we need an accurate 

database. Right now it is inaccurate. But the point you are raising 

is that having an accurate database actually poses a threat to the 

privacy and freedom of the United States. 

Can you see any provisions or steps that we might take, other 

than fines, because it is the Government that you have expressed 

a concern about, Big Brother for lack of a better word, by involving 

the private sector or some other steps we might take to ease the 

concerns that you have raised in your testimony? 

Mr. HARPER. It is a good question. You are definitely between a 

rock and a hard place in terms of a system that works really well. 

Well, it has to have really good data and a really strong biometric 

connection to the individual. The hard place is that that puts a lot 

of power in the hands of the Government to monitor people, to control them, and we should write policy with an eye down the horizon 

to a time when none of us are in power and someone might be in 

power that we don’t want to have in power. 

I think our Government is a great one. Our system is a great 

one. But it is not perfect and there is an uncertain future, so we 

have to design these systems, which are very powerful, with that 

in mind. 

The Federal Trade Commission had a meeting earlier this week, 

Monday and Tuesday. I didn’t attend all of it, but what I heard of 

it was very exciting, because I think people there recognize that 

distributed systems can provide all the security in some cases without the surveillance. And there are systems beginning to be created 

that put the person in control. It might be a card or token that the 

person carries and controls. And they have the power over what 

happens with the information. 

Centralizing is dangerous. Dispersing is better. There is a lot to 

come before we know how to do it. 

101

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you very much. And I think I will ask the 

staff to follow-up with the FTC on that distributed system idea. 

That is a new one to me. 

I am going to yield to Mr. King now, since we are expecting 

votes, for his 5 minutes. 

Mr. KING. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

Mr. Johnson, as I read through your testimony and read through 

your testimony, it was very efficiently delivered here, I want to 

comment, too. You got to a lot of material in in a short period of 

time. 

The question occurs to me, and it seems to me that when we step 

back and take a look at a situation that we have and ask how do 

we really want to fix this problem, how would you set your priorities first. And so I want to say this: if this Congress could devise 

a way to pass legislation that successfully brought compliance with 

the current law, with regard to illegal labor and illegal immigration 

and unlawful presence in the United States, and those that were 

unlawfully present in the United States transitioned back to their 

home countries, would you support that kind of legislation? 

I am not talking about a roundup. I am talking about legislation 

that simply puts incentives in place and if human nature fit our 

design, if they flowed back, do you want them to go home? 

Mr. JOHNSON. Well, Congressman, I think if it would allow them 

to go back to their home countries and then therefore—and not disqualify them from returning legally—in other words, they would 

not be subject ot the five or 10 year bar, we would certainly support that. But we wouldn’t support a requirement that would, well, 

require them to go back to their so-called home countries because 

I think as the Pew study has shown, frankly 5 percent of our workforce is compromised of undocumented workers, and many Members of the Chamber and other people representing part of our coalition believe these workers are necessary parts of their workforce. 

Mr. KING. Mr. Johnson, I am asking you, are they more necessary than the rule of law in the United States of America? Isn’t 

the rule of law a pillar of this Nation’s success? 

Mr. JOHNSON. Absolutely. But there are obviously various ways 

by which people can be punished for violating the law and being 

required to leave the country is one option. A civil fine is another 

option. There are many ways in which all of us as U.S. citizens 

‘‘violate the law,’’ whether we are speeding or otherwise. But you 

have to have a measure of proportionality and practicality and certainly civil fines——

Mr. KING. I understand your answer. And I thank you for that. 

I turn to Mr. Gibbs. You brought some curiosity, as I listened to 

your testimony, when you testified that 8 percent of the initial applicants that are run through Basic Pilot are rejected. 

Could it be possible that even that full 8 percent or perhaps more 

than that would be not lawful for them to work in the United 

States? It could be illegal applicants? 

Mr. GIBBS. No. That number is——

Mr. KING. How would you know? 

Mr. GIBBS. Well, that number is from CIS themselves. Their testimony this week, and Mr. Rosenbaum’s testimony was, that is 8 

percent incorrect non-confirmation. 

102

Mr. KING. I understand the basis for that response, but I would 

point out to you that it is not incorrect, because we have 98.6 percent of those applicants are ultimately approved between the initial 

check and the follow-up, where they have got the opportunity to 

present their records. 

And so I will submit that that is an indication that the Basic 

Pilot program is working. And many of those people that won’t 

apply for the secondary within that 72 hours probably have figured 

out that they have been caught in this process and that is why 

they don’t appeal. 

The gentlelady here has got such an interesting case. It is interesting also that she is here legally and she made the appeal and 

even then it was difficult, but she had the conviction because she 

had the confidence that she is lawfully present here. Many of those 

people do not. Do you concede that point? 

Mr. GIBBS. Well, no, I don’t concede the point. It seems to me 

that the numbers are 8 percent of people are erroneously non-confirmed and they——

Mr. KING. I won’t agree to that. Because 98.6 percent of them are 

ultimately approved. So if they are erroneously identified, that 

means there is something flawed in our system. We have got 99.8 

percent of all natural born American citizens that are approved. 

We have got 98.6 percent of all applicants that are approved. Eight 

percent rejected in the first test, and then the balance of those up 

to that 98.6 percent are approved. So I don’t know how you can 

make that statement, Mr. Gibbs. 

Mr. GIBBS. Eight percent in your district is 24,000 people who 

would have to do what Ms. Hong had to do. 

Mr. KING. That doesn’t mean, though, that they have been rejected. That just means that our system is working and we are 

cleaning the system up. 

Mr. GIBBS. I appreciate that. 

Mr. KING. Let me ask you another question, then, and that is 

how would you go about cleaning up a system if you weren’t to use 

it? I will submit that is the way we clean it up. We are cleaning 

it up now. Ms. Hong is—that is clean. I am glad that is clean. It 

is going to be a little hard work, but how else would you clean up 

the system? 

Mr. GIBBS. I really don’t understand how the agency—what they 

need to do. That is something the agency can best work on. 

Let me just make one other point, though. The 24,000, there is 

an important problem here, because many employers, according to 

WestStat studies, almost half of employers use the program to 

prescreen workers. So they were barred from even—they weren’t 

even told they were non-confirmed, but that is why they didn’t get 

offered the job. 

Ms. LOFGREN. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Mr. KING. I yield back. 

Ms. LOFGREN. We will go to Mr. Conyers, and if we can go very 

quickly so we don’t come back after this set of about 40 minutes 

of voting. 

Mr. CONYERS. Absolutely. 

Just as I was recovering from the Chamber of Commerce representative’s very fair and equal—a very excellent statement, and 

103

just as I was pulling out of it and making adjustments from my 

previous assumptions, here comes a Cato representative who 

sounds perfectly reasonable and normal about this approach to the 

subject matter and raises very clearly the concern that is where 

does the American worker fit into the immigration picture. 

I congratulate you, sir. Both of you are going to have to explain 

to your organizations why Conyers is aligning with you at this 

point. But that is your problem. 

But where do we fit in here, Gibbs and Harper? What is the 

deal? And this is a very important part of it. I come from where? 

Detroit, where we are being ripped to shreds by economic automobile relocation. Talk to me. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Quickly talk to him. 

Mr. CONYERS. Well, not Johnson. Johnson goes for it, but I want 

to hear from Gibbs and Harper. 

Mr. GIBBS. Well, that is why the union is so concerned about this 

program. The program will affect every worker. It will affect American workers who were born here, like you and I were. It affects 

people who immigrated here, like Ms. Hong. It affects workers who 

came seeking a better life but who haven’t been able to work 

through the Immigration Services system. 

That is why this program is so important, because it interfaces 

the Immigration Service process with our own citizenship process. 

If we don’t get it right, we are going to harm our entire workforce, 

whether it is citizens or non-citizens. That is why the union is so 

concerned, because we have Members who are the whole spectrum. 

Mr. HARPER. I guess I come to this issue and this broad problem 

with a disability, which is that I don’t know the answer to the total 

immigration reform problem. 

Analyzing this particular subset of the problem, I think that 

huge costs fall on the law-abiding native-born citizen from this 

kind of program, but I don’t have a solution that gets you out the 

other side. It is just that you have incredible costs in dollars, privacy, from an expanded or anywhere near perfected electronic 

verification system. 

Mr. CONYERS. I appreciate your candor and thank you all. 

Ms. LOFGREN. The gentleman from California, do you have one—

we have about 6 minutes before the vote will be called, so we are 

going to have to——

Mr. BERMAN. Just one question to Mr. Harper. 

From what I know about Cato, you are very concerned about intrusions on individual liberty and want to preserve maximum 

amounts of freedom and you hate regulation. What I ask is whether or not you can contemplate in a situation where we need to deal 

with an intolerable situation, which is the status quo, you conceive 

of regulatory measures glommed on to an electronic employment 

verification system which can minimize the potential for abuse of 

that system. 

Mr. HARPER. Hate is such a strong term. We have many concerns 

about excessive regulation. 

You know, you are going to do what you are going to do, and I 

am here to call it like I see it. I understand the good faith of everybody working on this problem to try to come to a solution. 

104

Frankly, in my written testimony, going through this, trying to 

figure out where to go on this, the sloppy system we have right 

now in the paper I-9, listen, I don’t think requiring employers to 

be immigration agents is a good policy in the first place. But if you 

are going to do it, the sloppy system you have now might be the 

best way. If you want to absolutely minimize false positives——

Mr. BERMAN. It is not a system. It is not a system. 

Mr. HARPER. It is a system. It is a really messy system. 

Mr. BERMAN. That insults the concept of system. 

Mr. HARPER. If you strengthen it, you are going to hurt Americans. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Ms. Waters, do you have any compelling——

Ms. WATERS. Just quickly. No, it is not a compelling question except to say this. Immigration reform is very complicated and we 

are going to have to work very, very hard. And in order to get a 

reasonable policy on a path to legalization, we are going to have 

to get tough on something. And tough on border enforcement and 

tough on employers and enforcement of sanctions against them for 

not really trying to do a good job is going to happen. 

And I just want to tell my friends at the Chamber of Commerce 

and any place else that coming here under the red, white and blue 

flag, trying to defend those practices and not wanting a tough 

verification system, it ain’t going to happen. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you for that statement. 

At this point, I am going to thank the witnesses for their testimony today. 

Without objection, Members will have 5 legislative days to submit any additional written questions to you, which we will forward 

and ask you to answer as promptly as you can to be made part of 

the record. 

Without objection, the record will remain open for 5 legislative 

days for the submission of other employment eligibility verification 

proposals and any other additional materials related to this important issue. 

Our hearing today has helped illuminate numerous issues concerning this system. Our next hearing will be on Wednesday, May 

2, at 2 p.m. in Room 2237. We will talk about the point system that 

the White House is discussing. 

With that, this hearing is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 11:35 a.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.] 

(105)

A P P E N D I X 

MATERIAL SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING RECORD

PREPARED STATEMENT OF SUSAN R. MEISINGER, PRESIDENT AND CEO, SOCIETY FOR

HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT AND CHAIR, HR INITIATIVE FOR A LEGAL RESOURCE

Madam Chairwoman, Congressman King, Members of the Committee. I am 

pleased to submit the following statement on behalf of the Society for Human Resource Management and the HR Initiative for a Legal Workforce. 

The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) is the world’s largest association devoted to human resource management. Representing more than 217,000 

individual members, the Society’s mission is both to serve human resource management professionals and to advance the profession. 

The Human Resource Initiative for a Legal Workforce represents human resource 

professionals in thousands of small and large U.S. employers representing every sector of the American economy. The HR Initiative and its members are seeking to improve the current process of employment verification by creating a secure, efficient 

and reliable system that will ensure a legal workforce and help prevent unauthorized employment, a root cause of illegal immigration. 

On behalf of both organizations, we thank the Committee for its work thus far 

in the area of improving America’s employment verification process. Our members 

represent the front lines on workforce verification, and offer a critical viewpoint. In 

the end, this is not just a debate about immigration reform, it is a debate about 

workplace management—which impacts all U.S. employers and all American workers, not just the foreign born. We do not believe there is a one-size-fits-all solution 

to employment verification. Rather we believe that private sector technologies can 

be effectively incorporated into the verification and hiring process. 

The subject of today’s hearing, ‘‘Improving the Electronic Employment Verification 

and Worksite Enforcement System’’ is central to deterring illegal immigration to the 

United States. It is no secret that the wide availability of jobs in this country has 

become the magnet for unauthorized migration. The most critical element for true 

immigration reform, therefore, is establishing a foolproof system for certifying that 

an applicant is authorized to work in the United States. Unfortunately, the electronic verification system in place today is inadequate to meet the demand, and current proposals before Congress fall far short of what is needed. 

Currently, employees are permitted to submit up to 29 different legally-acceptable 

documents as proof of eligibility to hold a job in the United States. This documentbased system is prone to fraud, forgeries and identity theft, making it difficult, if 

not impossible, for an employer to differentiate between the legal and illegal worker. 

Adding to the problem, the federal government’s voluntary electronic verification 

program, the ‘‘Basic Pilot,’’ is inadequate to meet the needs of all U.S. employers 

because it cannot stop identity fraud. 

U.S. employers, whether large or small, cannot be expected to consistently identify 

unauthorized workers using the existing system, but they are liable for severe sanctions if these workers find their way onto the payroll. At the same time, they are 

subject to claims of discrimination if they question the validity documents too much. 

The proliferation of false or stolen documents can and does cause reputable employers to mistakenly hire individuals who are not eligible to work. At the same 

time, the lack of certainty and threat of government-imposed penalties may lead 

some employers to delay or forego hiring legal workers who are eligible. In either 

case, the costs are high for both U.S. employers and legal workers. 

Employers need the right tools to verify a legal workforce. However, HR cannot—

and should not—be America’s surrogate border patrol agents. Rather, employers are 

entitled to an unambiguous answer to the query whether an employee is authorized 

to accept an offer of employment. 

106

Congress must transform the current paper-based verification process into a stateof-the-art electronic system that is accurate, reliable, cost-efficient, easy-to-use, and 

shares responsibility among government, employers and employees. Specifically, we 

advocate a system that would verify identity through additional background checks 

and the potential use of biometric enrollment conducted by government certified private vendors. By eliminating subjective determinations of work authorization documents, this system will eliminate discrimination and simplify enforcement. 

However, before any employment verification system is mandated, it must meet 

the following Principles:

Principle 1: Shared Responsibility Among Government, Employers and Employees—U.S. employers, employees and the federal government share responsibility for a reliable, efficient, accurate system to verify employment eligibility.

Principle 2: Fair Enforcement—U.S. employers should be liable for their own 

hiring decisions, not those made outside their control.

Principle 3: Accuracy and Reliability—Employers should not be forced to participate until the government provides assurances that the system is accurate and 

reliable.

Principle 4: Ease of Use—The new verification system should be easy to understand and to implement at all worksites.

Principle 5: Deployment of Latest Technologies—A new verification system 

must make false documents and identity theft ineffective. One way to achieve effective and efficient worksite enforcement is to include biometric identifiers or other 

state-of-the-art technology in the identity and work authorization process that is capable of automatically recognizing an individual’s identity.

If adequately funded and fairly administered, SHRM and the HR Initiative believe this new system could eradicate virtually all unauthorized employment—thereby eliminating a huge incentive for illegal immigration. It will also eliminate discrimination by taking the subjectivity out of the verification process. 

True employment verification is the only way to ensure fair and equitable treatment for those individuals who should have access to legitimate jobs. It is essential 

for a legal workforce and for America’s national and economic security. 

I would again like to thank the Committee. We look forward to working with you 

to implement the solutions advocated by SHRM and the HR Initiative for a Legal 

Workforce. 

Attached are the following HR Initiative for a Legal Workforce documents:

1. Principles

2. Concepts for Secure Electronic Employment Verification System

3. Frequently Asked Questions

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ATTACHMENTS


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JOINT STATEMENT OF THE AIR CONDITIONING CONTRACTORS OF AMERICA, THE ASSOCIATED BUILDERS AND CONTRACTORS, THE ASSOCIATED GENERAL CONTRACTORS, 

THE MASON CONTRACTORS ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA, THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION

OF HOME BUILDERS, THE NATIONAL ROOFING CONTRACTORS ASSOCIATION, THE NATIONAL UTILITY CONTRACTORS ASSOCIATION, AND THE PLUMBING-HEATING-COOLING CONTRACTORS—NATIONAL ASSOCIATION


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PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE ELECTRONIC EMPLOYMENT VERIFICATION SYSTEM

WORKING GROUP BY ANGELO I. AMADOR, CO-CHAIR UNITED STATES CHAMBER OF

COMMERCE; KELLY KNOTT, CO-CHAIR, ASSOCIATED GENERAL CONTRACTORS OF

AMERICA; AND SCOTT VINSON, CO-CHAIR, NATIONAL RETAIL FEDERATION/NATIONAL

COUNCIL OF CHINA RESTAURANTS


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PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE ESSENTIAL WORKER IMMIGRANT COALITION


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PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE NATIONAL COUNCIL OF LA RAZA


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PREPARED STATEMENT OF TYLER MORAN, EMPLOYMENT POLICY DIRECTOR,

NATIONAL IMMIGRATION LAW CENTER


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Æ


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