But even though DHS has ratcheted up its enforcement effort, this year's 92 criminal arrests of employers still amount to a drop in the bucket of a national economy that includes 6 million companies that employ more than 7 million unauthorized workers, several analysts said. Only 17 firms faced criminal fines or other forfeitures this year.
Immigrant Crackdown Falls Short
Despite Tough Rhetoric, Few Employers of Illegal Workers Face Criminal Charges
By Spencer S. Hsu
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, December 25, 2007; A03
In its announced clampdown on companies that hire illegal workers, the federal government has arrested nearly four times as many people in the past year as it did two years ago, but only a tiny fraction of those arrests involved criminal charges against those who hired the workers, according to a year-end tally prepared by the Department of Homeland Security.
Fewer than 100 owners, supervisors or hiring officials were arrested in fiscal 2007, compared with nearly 4,900 arrests that involved illegal workers, providers of fake documents and others, the figures show. Immigration experts say the data illustrate the Bush administration's limited success at delivering on its rhetoric about stopping illegal hiring by corporate employers.
"I know what it takes to get a criminal case," said Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.), a former state prosecutor and member of the Senate Homeland Security Committee. ". . . Why is it that hundreds of bar owners can be sanctioned in Missouri every year for letting somebody with a fake ID have a beer, but we can't manage to sanction hundreds of employers for letting people use fake identities to obtain a job?"
Democratic political consultants have advised the party's lawmakers -- who already are on the defensive about immigration policy -- that the Bush administration's failure to more aggressively target powerful corporations may be a vulnerability for Republican candidates who are seeking to make immigration a campaign issue.
Bush administration officials have promised to strike at the "magnet" of jobs luring illegal immigrants into the country, a goal supported by experts across the political spectrum. "The days of treating employers who violate these laws by giving them the equivalent of a corporate parking ticket -- those days are gone. It's now felonies, jail time, fines and forfeitures," Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said at a Nov. 6 news conference.
In a year-end review this month, Chertoff added that the enforcement crackdown will "make a down payment on credibility with the American people." He said Americans' "profound public skepticism" about government efforts to control illegal immigration helped kill a broad, White House-backed overhaul in the Senate this summer.
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