Under a controversial new federal immigration rule, employers will be required to fire employees who cannot prove that they are in the country legally.
The Department of Homeland Security rule, which was finalized on Friday and will take effect within 30 days, could have almost immediate implications for the upcoming harvest season in Wisconsin because farmers here, as elsewhere around the country, depend heavily on immigrant workers to help pick crops.
"They might have to fire a large number of employees who have not been able to present valid or verifiable employment authorization," said Glorily Lopez, an immigration law attorney in Madison.
Lopez said the federal government proposed stepped-up enforcement rules about a year ago but didn't finalize them until Friday in order to give Congress time to enact comprehensive immigration reform. When lawmakers failed to reach a deal this summer, the immigration agency likely decided to wait no longer, Lopez said.
Patrick Hickey, coordinator of the Workers' Rights Center, said the new rule will wreak havoc on employers and employees alike.
"It completely changes the way things are done," he said.
Under the new regulation, employers will have 90 days to resolve discrepancies flagged by the Social Security Administration involving the Social Security numbers of employees. If these discrepancies cannot be resolved, and employees can't produce proper working papers, employers are obligated to fire the employees, Hickey said.
Employers who don't take the proper action after receiving these "no-match" letters from the Social Security Administration will be subject to fines and prison time, he added.
In the past, the Social Security Administration would send out such letters with explicit instructions not to fire employees who can't provide adequate documentation, said Pete Hanson, director of government relations for the Wisconsin Restaurant Association.
Hanson said employers were told such an action could amount to discrimination.
Standardization of the verification process could be beneficial to employers, Hanson said, if the new rule doesn't put employers in a Catch-22 -- required by law to terminate employees, but still subject to discrimination lawsuits.
"If that's the case, it wouldn't be fair to employers," he said.
Hanson said dealing with illegal immigration in a piecemeal fashion is not the way to go.
"We would prefer to see comprehensive immigration reform that would secure the borders, provide a way for workers who are in America but undocumented to become documented and stay here and continue working, and fix the situation with no-match letters," he said.
Hanson also noted that the federal government should "provide a real way for employers to verify a person's status." There is no hotline or database employers can use, he said.
Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff told The Associated Press on Friday that the new rule clarifies verification procedures for employers.
"This regulation lays out a clear pattern for doing the right thing, which will afford protection for employers," he said.
Chertoff held a news conference Friday with Carlos Gutierrez, Commerce secretary, to announce they were moving forward with new administrative attempts to crack down on illegal immigration in light of Congress' recent failure to enact comprehensive reform.