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January 29, 2007
By Fawn Johnson
Both business and union lobbyists are angling to have an illegal immigration amendment sponsored by Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., removed from a minimum wage increase bill before it goes to the president. The amendment, which was hastily and unexpectedly approved 94-0 last week, would bar employers from seeking federal contracts for seven to 10 years if they are found to have employed illegal workers. The Association of General Contractors told senators in a letter that it would make it one of the group's key votes, saying it would use the equivalent of a "corporate death sentence" to punish first-time offenders of immigration law. Some businesses subsist completely on government contracts, said Kelly Knott, AGC's director of government affairs. "If you let two people slip through [the so-called I-9 verification] process, you have to shut down your whole business."
Sessions' amendment would waive the contracting bar for employers that participate in the Homeland Security Department's voluntary "Basic Pilot" employee verification system, but Knott said that program "needs a lot of fixing."
The AFL-CIO, for its part, is focusing its opposition to the amendment on the Basic Pilot program. "At the end of the day, it gives employers a safe harbor for employing undocumented workers," said AFL-CIO legislative representative Sonia Ramirez. "It's bad policy. It mandates participation in a flawed program." The AFL-CIO has long argued that an employee verification system should include protections for workers to keep employers from using it as a tool of discrimination. The Basic Pilot program does not include such protections, and Ramirez pointed out that even GAO has said it is "not ready for prime time."
It is unclear whether the Sessions' amendment will muddy the already murky path the minimum wage bill will take after being approved by the Senate Tuesday or Wednesday. House and Senate leaders have yet to resolve their differences over whether a small business tax package should be included with a minimum wage increase. "The contours of the debate have been focused on targeted tax provisions coupled with a minimum wage hike," said a business lobbyist who has been involved in negotiating the small business tax package in the Senate bill. "This [Sessions] amendment is considered ... not minimum wage-related."
Even if advocates are successful in arguing that Sessions' amendment does not belong on a minimum wage bill, the 94-0 vote in its favor complicates the issue when lawmakers begin debating immigration in earnest later this year. Both Ramirez and Knott said lawmakers may not have realized what they were voting on when the Sessions amendment came up, but it could be difficult for lawmakers to step back from their initial support for the proposal. "It's hard for anyone to vote against an employer verification system," Knott said. "It's a very politically lucrative thing to say that you want to hold employers accountable," Ramirez said.
"But there was not sufficient time for debate and appreciation of what was really being voted on." Knott offered one potential argument that could allow lawmakers to reverse course on the issue: Sessions' amendment could violate current federal contracting law because it would bypass a 10-part test for debarment. While AGC was the only business group to "key vote" the amendment, other business groups weighed in as well. The Essential Worker Immigration Coalition, representing industries that employ low-wage workers, and the Electronic Employee Verification System Working Group both sent letters to Capitol Hill last week opposing Sessions' amendment, arguing the proposal should be considered as part of a debate on a comprehensive immigration bill.
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Political Advertisement Paid by "Texans for Sensible Immigration Policy"
P.O. Box 7011 · Houston, Texas 77248-7011 · 713.869.8346 · info@tsiponline.com
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