Unintended Consequence: E-Verify Aimed To Stop Unauthorized Workers But Might Be Fueling More Fraud

By Joshua Shimkus, flatwaterfreepress.org In the hours after federal immigration officers descended on Glenn Valley Foods, company officials and elected leaders made one point clear: Glenn Valley had worked to avoid the exact situation it found itself in.As proof, they pointed to the Omaha meatpacking plant’s use of E-Verify, a federal system meant to help employers confirm a person’s ability to work legally in the U.S.“We’ve done everything we’re supposed to do as a company,” Glenn Valley Foods President Chad Hartmann said at the time. A spokesperson for Immigration and Customs Enforcement later alleged that roughly 70 employees had used stolen identities — a form of fraud that E-Verify, which bills itself as “the best means available to confirm the employment eligibility of new hires,” is incapable of detecting.The situation laid bare long-standing arguments over the system, its effectiveness and its impact on the workforce. Advocates, including a Nebraska lawmaker, say that increasing its use among employers is key to improving the country’s immigration system. But critics point to E-Verify’s flaws, such as those allegedly exploited at Glenn Valley, as evidence that immigration reform is the only solution to addressing the underlying issue and preventing harm to Nebraska employers and communities.Craig Casados, executive director of the Nebraska Hospitality Association, said the association’s members all use E-Verify, and they all want to follow the rules.“There’s been a lot of talk of people saying within the federal government that E-Verify doesn’t work right,” Casados said. “That really confuses all of the restaurateurs throughout the United States that are like, ‘But that’s not our fault, we’re doing it exactly how it’s supposed to be done.’”Prior to 1986, employers could hire immigrants who had come to the United States illegally. That changed after Congress passed the Immigration Reform and Control Act, which made it illegal to knowingly hire immigrants who lacked work authorization. The law introduced the I-9 Employment Eligibility Form that is still in use today. When filling out the form on their first day of work, new employees must provide proof — such as a passport or a combination of a driver’s license and Social Security card — of their identity and ability to legally work in the U.S.As long as the documents “reasonably appear to be genuine,” the employer must accept them. Federal law prohibits employers from asking for specific documents or discriminating based on an employee’s citizenship, immigration status or national origin.The law led to problems. A 1990 report by the Government Accountability Office said that the law seemed to reduce illegal immigration, but also led to discrimination in the hiring process and a large amount of fraudulent documentation. “Before E-Verify, an employee would maybe make up the Social Security number,” said Amy Peck with the national law firm Jackson Lewis. “You know, there’s no validation, and it might look authentic, and that person would get hired.”In 1996, Congress established a “basic pilot program” — what eventually became E-Verify — to curb unauthorized immigration. A free, online system, E-Verify compares an employee’s I-9 documents to records maintained by the Social Security Administration and the Department of Homeland Security.If the provided documents match the federal records, the employee is quickly approved and can start working their new job. If the documents don’t match the federal records, the employee has10 working days to resolve the mismatch.The system can help flag forged documents and made-up numbers. But it can’t identify whether the I-9 documents provided actually belong to the person using them.“It’s an unintended consequence,” Peck said. “The more employers that use E-Verify, the higher identity theft or identity borrowing is.”The June 10 enforcement operation at Glenn Valley was triggered by a Homeland Security audit of I-9 employment eligibility forms, which revealed suspected document fraud, according to court documents.After the operation, an ICE spokesperson said the roughly 70 employees detained by ICE had “stolen the identities of Latino Americans with zero regard for the victims they left in their wake.” As of July 22, approximately 25 of these workers had been released on bail, 25 were still detained and around 17 had already been deported. In a statement after the raid, U.S. Rep. Don Bacon, a Republican representing Omaha and surrounding areas, noted that Glenn Valley Foods “complied with E-Verify 100 percent and is a victim in this as well.”Gary Rohwer, founder and owner of Glenn Valley Foods, did not respond to a request for comment.Evidence of E-Verify’s effectiveness is mixed. A 2014 study concluded that universal E-Verify mandates reduce the hourly earnings of male Mexican immigrants who were likely unauthorized. But it found no evidence that the mandates reduced employment among Mexican immigrants who were likely unauthorized. As far back as 2009, an outside evaluation of E-Verify pointed to identity fraud as a workaround. The report estimated that approximately half of the unauthorized workers with cases submitted to E-Verify were cleared to work by the system.Alex Nowrasteh, vice president for economic and social policy studies at the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank, has long been critical of E-Verify. He said that to be successful, E-Verify would have to work as part of a national identity program, requiring biometric information like fingerprints to verify that a person is who they claim to be.“I am radically opposed to that for just about every reason you could imagine, but I think that is the only way that a really effective interior immigration enforcement system will work,” Nowrasteh said.Even with shortcomings and well-documented workarounds, E-Verify use by states and employers is growing. Under federal law, only certain contractors are required to use the system, but 21 states have laws requiring certain employers to use E-Verify. In Nebraska since 2009, public employers and public contractors have had to use the system, along with businesses that participate in state tax incentive programs.Any business, though, can use E-Verify. In Nebraska, over 7,000 employers have open accounts with E-Verify, representing a wide variety of businesses, everything from restaurants to banks. Still, some lawmakers think this isn’t enough. In January, state Sen. Kathleen Kauth of Omaha introduced a bill that would require Nebraska businesses to use E-Verify. She said that she saw her bill as a first step toward reducing immigrants in the state working without authorization, and that part of her motivation was to get a better understanding of the number of unauthorized workers in Nebraska and the impact that they might have on state services.“Let’s start seeing what happens when we have every business doing this — are they all of a sudden seeing that they need more people,” Kauth said. “It’s really a way of trying to get data collection — to figure out what is the actual scope of the issue here in the state.”Kauth isn’t the first Nebraska lawmaker to propose this idea. Sen. Brad Ashford proposed a similar bill in 2009, Sen. Bill Kinter brought one in 2015 and Sen. Tom Brewer proposed one in 2017. None made it to the floor for a vote. Kauth’s bill also ran into opposition. Kris Bousquet, the executive director of the Nebraska State Dairy Association, was among those who spoke against the bill at a hearing.The association’s farmers and livestock producers comply with all state and federal laws, he said. What they really need are reforms and updates to the current federal guestworker programs.“Finding people that are willing and able to perform these jobs is challenging enough, and if those jobs go unfilled, our livestock producers are faced with serious production restrictions and animal welfare issues,” said Bousquet, who testified on behalf of several agricultural associations.In an interview, Darcy Tromanhauser of Nebraska Appleseed said that updating federal laws would serve the interests of Nebraska communities. Tromanhauser highlighted a variety of federal immigration laws that used to receive periodic updates but no longer do, comparing them to outdated infrastructure like an old road full of potholes.“Employers want to be able to keep folks who are trained and talented, and not have turnover and instability,” Tromanhauser said.Kauth argued against the idea that legal residents won’t work in some of the Nebraska jobs that need filling, saying that immigrants working without authorization suppresses wages and makes these jobs less desirable. Her bill didn’t make it to a floor for a vote in the 2025 legislative session, but she said that she has been working in the interim to find the best way to draft the bill to garner more support.Casados of the Nebraska Hospitality Association said that his organization and every restaurant or hospitality association across the country are all pushing for new immigration laws and clear pathways in these laws. He said that the debate around immigration is motivating more restaurant and hotel leaders to join advocacy groups to fight for reform.“When laws are 40 years old and don’t relate to today,” Casados said, “it’s not working.”

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