Bid to Delay Employer Sanctions in Alien Law Is Pushed

With a Senate panel’s passage of a last-ditch amendment this week, an effort to postpone the employer sanctions in the new immigration reform law is gathering steam, supporters said Friday.

The campaign is being spearheaded by Sen. Dennis DeConcini (D-Ariz.), who complained in an interview that many businesses contacted “said they didn’t know anything about the sanctions,” which are scheduled to go into effect June 1.

The sanctions make employers who knowingly hire illegal immigrants subject to fines ranging from $250 to $10,000 and possible jail terms. The landmark Immigration Reform and Control Act law, which President Reagan signed last Nov. 6, also requires all new employees--including U.S. citizens--to submit documents proving they are legal residents, and employers must certify the documents’ validity.

Panel Approves Delay

DeConcini’s measure for a four-month delay, approved Thursday by the Senate Appropriations Committee, is attached to a $9.4-billion supplemental appropriations bill that includes $148 million for the Immigration and Naturalization Service. Next week, the measure is expected to go to the full Senate, where DeConcini said he believes it has “a 50-50 chance.”

The effort to delay the sanctions is a reflection of the growing discontent with the INS campaign to educate the public about the law’s dramatic new features. Groups as diverse as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the American Immigration Lawyers Assn. and the American Civil Liberties Union have voiced strong criticism as the deadline approaches.

Citing widespread confusion and lack of information about the law, chamber attorney Virginia Lamp called the committee vote “a step in the right direction.”

A Chief Architect

However, some lawmakers, notably Sen. Alan K. Simpson (R-Wyo.), a chief architect of the reform legislation, have insisted no further delay is warranted after so many years of work to get a new law, which makes many illegal aliens who have lived in the country for more than five years eligible for legal residency. The processing period for their applications begins Tuesday.

“The legalization provisions are going into effect . . . without delay,” said Mary Kay Hill, Simpson’s press secretary. “The employer sanctions go hand in hand with that.”

Given six months to conduct a public information campaign, the INS has held a number of news conferences to discuss the law’s provisions. However, critics have said the agency waited too long to get started.

DeConcini noted that the agency only last month issued the contracts for nationwide publicity on the law, and that the final regulations were just published Friday.

Piia Aarma of the National Assn. of Manufacturers called delaying the sanctions “a good idea.” She said that although the association has “encouraged our members to comply,” many of its 13,500 member firms are in areas where few illegal immigrants live and some firms do not yet understand it applies to all employees.

ACLU Backs Delay

The ACLU said it supports DeConcini’s amendment because it believes some employers are already firing people simply because they “look or sound foreign,” although anyone hired before the bill became law Nov. 6 is “grandfathered in” and not required to prove legal residency.

Nevertheless, getting final approval for a delay will not be easy.

Simpson has indicated he will introduce a measure to kill the amendment, and Richard Estrada, director of research at the Federation for American Immigration Reform, said he believes businesses are trying to maintain as long as possible their “virtually limitless pool of cheap labor.”

DeConcini said he is seeking a delay, not a repeal. “It makes good common sense-- which may be enough to defeat it around here,” he remarked.