California Employers in a Bind Over Immigration Enforcement

AGENDA 21 RADIO

LOS ANGELES—After reports recently rippled across California’s agricultural heartland that immigration agents might audit farms, Bryan Little of the California Farm Bureau Federation sent an email alert to thousands of farmers warning them not to run afoul of a new state law governing their interactions with federal immigration officials.

The law requires California employers to ask immigration agents for warrants or subpoenas before allowing them access to private areas of the workplace or confidential employee records. Employers who break the law, which took effect in January, face fines of up to $10,000.

Businesses are increasingly caught between California and Washington as the state seeks to shield illegal immigrants from deportation, and the Trump administration intensifies enforcement. As the state works out how to enforce the law, employers say the new requirements are confusing.

“It’s just this conflict of intention: On the one hand the federal government is aiming for stringent enforcement, and the state wants to frustrate that,” said Mr. Little, director of employment policy at the farm bureau. “Our members find themselves stuck in the middle.”

Shortly after the law went into effect, federal immigration agents served audit notices to 7-Eleven convenience stores across California, part of a national audit of the stores. A number of workers were arrested in California stores as those audits were served, according to state officials.

Democratic State Attorney General Xavier Becerra responded by warning businesses to heed the law. In a press conference, he reminded employers “that if they voluntarily start giving up information about their employees in ways that contradict our new California laws, they subject themselves to actions by my office.”

Spokesmen for Mr. Becerra and the state’s labor commissioner said both offices would soon issue expanded guidance for employers.

Nearly three weeks after the 7-Eleven raids, agents served notices of inspection to about 77 businesses in San Francisco, Sacramento, San Jose, and surrounding areas, said James Schwab, a spokesman for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, known as ICE. 

Mr. Schwab said no arrests were made, but that investigations are ongoing and that ICE agents didn’t face any new procedural requests in the operation.

Federal law requires immigration agents to present a notice of inspection, which gives employers three days to provide documents showing their workers are eligible to work in the U.S. The agents often, but not always, carry warrants or other formal written orders to compel compliance, according to state and federal officials. The California law requires employers to ask for those documents before releasing more detailed information.

David Chiu, the California Assembly member who drafted the legislation, said the law doesn’t require any new documents from immigration agents not already federally required. “But given past practice and the rhetoric under Trump, we thought it prudent to reinstate the law at the state level,” said Mr. Chiu, a Democrat.

Mr. Schwab, of ICE, said the law “reflects yet another effort by the State of California to interfere with federal immigration enforcement authorities.”

Sandra Diaz, vice president of United Service Workers West, a union representing janitors, airport workers, and security guards, said many low-wage workers are happy to have additional protections.

 
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She said agents often show up announced, catching everyone off-guard, and sometimes ask questions beyond what federal law allows or in an intimidating way that prompts managers or employees to share more information on the spot than required. Mr. Schwab said agents are professional in how they present themselves.

Still, many business owners in California say they aren’t sure exactly what the new law means. Some small-business owners hadn’t heard of it, and those who had said they weren’t sure they’d be able to recognize a warrant or subpoena.

Others said the new law could push more immigrants to work as independent contractors, which employers sometimes use to bypass having to confirm whether immigrants can legally work, according to employers in agriculture, the restaurant business, and housekeeping.

The owner of a small housekeeping business in California, who didn’t want to be named for fear of attracting attention from authorities, said the outfit had been planning to move its entire its staff to full-time employment but is now reconsidering. Instead, the business may opt for more contractors.

Meanwhile, Bakersfield-area farmer Steven Murray said the feuding between Washington and Sacramento clouds solutions to what he said is a broader and more urgent issue: how to legalize millions of illegal immigrants already a part of the American workforce.

Undocumented immigrants make up at least half the agriculture workforce, according to industry estimates.

“Right now we have a serious shortage of labor to get the crops cultivated and harvested,” said Mr., Murray, who has grown the region’s famed stone-fruits and avocados since 1989. “And we don’t have anything to address the people who have been working for us loyally for decades.”

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