One of the most popular ways to describe action—or, more accurately, inaction—on a difficult issue on Capitol Hill is to say that Congress is “kicking the can down the road.”

That could be the outcome for employer verification—an element of immigration policy that must be addressed this year despite political gridlock. The law that enacted the government electronic verification system called E-Verify will expire in November.

But the partisan and interest-group fissures on immigration extend to the question of increasing work-site enforcement. The fault lines that could prevent substantial action were revealed again this week.

Frustrated that Congress did not pass a comprehensive immigration reform bill last year, the Bush administration is trying to prove its enforcement bona fides through the regulatory process. On Monday, June 9, the Department of Homeland Security announced that all federal contractors—more than 200,000 companies—will be required to use E-Verify, an electronic system that checks work eligibility against the Social Security database.

This move upsets many in the business community, especially HR groups like the Society for Human Resource Management. They say that E-Verify is prone to error because there are millions of mistakes in Social Security records. They also assert that it cannot stop identity theft and can’t be ramped up for use by all 7 million U.S. employers. Currently, about 69,000 participate voluntarily.

SHRM and other members of the HR Initiative for a Legal Workforce are promoting a bill authored by Rep. Sam Johnson, R-Texas, that would replace E-Verify—and the I-9 process—with an electronic system based upon an existing child-support enforcement network in which about 90 percent of U.S. employers participate.

Bills that would extend and expand E-Verify get strong support from other Republicans and conservative Democrats.

But Democratic leadership is skeptical of E-Verify. That was apparent at a House Judiciary subcommittee hearing on employer verification on Tuesday, June 10. Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-California and chairwoman of the panel, highlighted several studies that call into question E-Verify’s efficacy.

“Before we move forward on any mandatory [electronic system] to include all employers, we must be careful to ensure all the problems in the existing [electronic system] are addressed before we end up with the same problems, but on a much larger scale,” Lofgren said at the hearing.

It’s a matter of constituent service for someone like Lofgren. If an American citizen or a permanent resident is denied employment, he or she no doubt will place a hostile call to his or her member of Congress.

Another situation that prompts angry communication with members of Congress is any problem with Social Security. A number of Democrats are concerned that foisting employment verification on the Social Security Administration will exacerbate problems the agency is having in dealing with disability claims.

And many Democrats, like Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, D-Michigan, are incensed about what they believe is the Bush administration’s tendency to use E-Verify to arrest suspected illegal workers while letting business owners off the hook.

On the other side, you have conservative Republicans and Democrats who see work-site enforcement as the illegal immigration remedy that their constituents demand. And they advocate E-Verify with gusto.

“We have a system that is almost perfect now,” said Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa and ranking member of the House Judiciary Subcommittee. “We can grow this system. The answer is to use it.”

The author of the original bill to establish E-Verify made a similar point. “E-Verify has never been notified of an incorrect non-confirmation,” said Rep. Ken Calvert, R-California.

At the hearing, one of the witnesses, likely invited by the Republicans on the subcommittee, touted E-Verify.

“I think it’s a great system to work with,” said Glenda Wooten-Ingram, HR director at the Embassy Suites in downtown Washington. 

There are 11 bills introduced in Congress that address employer verification. They range from the Johnson bill to replace it to several bills that would make it permanent and mandatory.

But with all the political discord on the issue, the likely outcome this year is something incremental—like a temporary extension of a voluntary E-Verify. Congress will kick the can down the road.