Hiring Penalties Cutting Illegal Alien Influx, INS Says

New penalties for hiring illegal aliens cut substantially into the number of Mexicans who tried to cross illegally into the United States last month, the nation’s top immigration official said Wednesday.

Alan C. Nelson, commissioner of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, said the INS in June apprehended only 64,208 illegal aliens trying to enter the United States from Mexico, an 11% drop from the previous month and a 32% reduction from the level of June, 1987.

Nelson said that fewer aliens were attracted to this country in June because employers were providing fewer jobs for them. Under a provision of the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act that took effect on June 1, employers who knowingly hire illegal aliens face fines ranging from $250 to $10,000 and possible jail terms.

‘Sanctions Taking Effect’

“Employer sanctions are beginning to take effect,” Nelson told a news conference. “There is no other logical reason that you’d have this kind of drop. If someone else has a better explanation than the immigration bill, then we’d sure like to hear it.”

Nelson said that the INS had served employers with 55 notices of fines totaling $597,450 since June 1. That figure was higher than the $448,450 levied the entire previous year, when the INS merely warned first offenders and could impose fines only on repeat offenders. And Nelson promised an increasing number of fines as the INS hires more investigators.

Additional Border Patrol agents along the 2,000-mile U.S.-Mexican border are also deterring illegal crossings, INS officials said. The 1986 immigration law authorized the INS to build up its Border Patrol from 2,200 agents in 1985 to a goal of 4,200 by next January.

In addition, Hugh Brien, chief of the Border Patrol, said that the amount of overtime by agents had increased 15% this year. “Our line and watch activity is really going up,” he said.

The declining number of apprehensions of illegal aliens in June reversed a trend that had begun at the start of the year.

Apprehensions Had Been Up

During the first five months of this year, before the tough employer sanctions took effect, the INS had been apprehending increasing numbers of illegal aliens along the southern border. Apprehensions averaged about 98,000 per month for January through June of this year, up 12% from the same months of 1987.

San Diego led the nation with 28,346 apprehensions in June, but that represented a 36% reduction from June, 1987.

The 1986 immigration law also allowed long-term illegal immigrants to apply through May 4 for amnesty. INS officials, releasing final figures, said that 1,757,199 individuals applied for legal residency.

A separate program providing amnesty for farm workers remains in effect through Nov. 30, and the INS said that 479,530 people have applied for legal status under this program.

The INS is approving 96% of the applications of those who applied for legal status through the program that ended in May, officials said. But Richard Norton, an associate INS commissioner, said that “at least 20%” of the applications from farm workers are being investigated for fraud.

The agricultural worker program requires a shorter residency period--only 90 days during the year ending in May, 1986--and less documentation than the main program did.