If you were at a protest of a corporation that had hired undocumented workers

[RB TexLa]

and when you looked around there were several members of the Ku Klux Klan protesting side by side with you....






http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/02/06/klan.report.ap/index.html

[daveskilt]

1. I run a business - It is not my job to be the INS

I have a dozen or so employees who are probably not legal. I inherited most of them when i became CEO. Some have been with us as much as 16 years - all of them are very good at their jobs and have great attitudes - as do all of the people at my work (those not fitting this description were gone very soon after I got there).

It is always easy to vilify the corporation (and many are deserving) but as in any issue there are nuances. Should I then fire these people? or spend time checking to see if the documentation they provided years ago is false? If I fire them what will happen to them? they will get other jobs that will pay them a LOT less.

The issue I have with corporations is not about hiring illegal immigrants - it is about paying human beings less because they are immigrants.

My first paycheck in the US was for -$3. (a one hour training meeting for my job as a dishwasher at $5 an hour less the $8 of "extra federal tax" they used to assess to non citizen workers on each paycheck.

this is about human rights and workers rights - when corporations pay lousy wages and get away with it they are incented to bring in more undocumented workers and further deflate wages of US workers. Pay people well and this issue goes away - competition for jobs is then based on skills and ethic rather than on who you can pay the least to. Frankly if american workers cant compete on skills and work ethic then screw em. i want the best people for the job wherever they were born and I want to reward them with the best pay in the industry.

[Sapere aude]

2. The law says you need an I-9 form on file for each employee.

Make sure you have the form on file and that you document the types of identification given to you to prove the employee's eligibility to work in the U.S. If you do that you have done what you should. If you are presented with false documentation and you do not know it is false you have done what you should. If you do not have an I-9 form for each employee and you do not bother to check the employee's eligibility to work in this country you are in violation of the law. You must accept the consequences of your decision and don't ask or blame your hiring of illegals on anyone else. You choose to do what you do, no one makes that decision for you.

If you feel they should be given the job contrary to the law, you must accept the results. Chances are you could get raided and the workers deported and forced to break up their families. It's happening everyday. Also the illegals even if they've worked here for many years are flown to a border town outside of the state where they are working and forced to go to Mexico on their own. If they are deported and come back to be with their families here and are found they face 10 years in prison.

You must take the responsibility of your actions.

Personally I think the illegals such as those working for you should have a right to gain citizenship and to remain in this country.

[daveskilt]

10. they all have I-9's

Every year I get social security mismatch letters for a few employees. My legal obligation is to give them those letters and tell them to go to the SS office and "clear up the misunderstanding" as i look in the files some of the old SS cards are obvious fakes. I haven't hired anyone with an obvious fake SS card but I'm not going to fire people who have worked here for years because someone else hired them.

[Rosemary2205]

3. What do we do if KKK and Phelps decides to join us at anti-Iraq protests?

If it's a cause I believe in I'm not leaving because the rednecky neighbors are there too.

BTW, I would boycott a business that goes out of it's way NOT to hire Americans. I would only attend an in person protest if they were doing it to union bust and I'd be there to support the union.

[greenissexy]

4. I don't understand

No, I really don't. Why would you be on the side that wants to hurt people that need a job to support their family? Why would you try to get some poor guy fired?

[Bluebear]

5. Why would anybody here be at such a protest???

[RB TexLa]

6. I'm really surprised the anti-immigration people haven't let you know yet

There are many of them that will tell you about how it "destroys" our way of life.

[Katherine Brengle]

7. Assuming I chose to appear at such a protest, I would move very very far away from said KKK members

but I wouldn't be at a protest if I wasn't damn serious about its ends, so no, I would not leave...

[Beelzebud]

8. Flawed question. The KKK would be protesting people, not a company.

They would protest against Mexican people because they just hate them and want them gone.

We'd be protesting a company because they're breaking the law, by exploiting vulnerable human beings with no protections under the labor laws, to rob the American worker out of a fair wage.

[pampango]

9. But you would both be at the protest, right?

The RW is fratured over this. One group wants to build a high wall to keep out the brown people. The other, the big money boys, wants to let them in to provide cheap labor.

We are fractured, too. Some look at illegals immigrants as a threat to blue collar workers, especially on the lower end of the income scale, either as a threat to their job or downward pressure on their wages. Others support immigrants as consistent with fighting racism and for humanitarian reasons.

I have seen quite a few posters here at DU who favor the "high wall" approach to keep out the imports. Some apply that concept to immigrants as well, figuring that you are losing jobs either way - to imported goods or imported people.

[daveskilt]

11. simple solution - enforce minimum wage

easier than figuring our who has faked documents and who doesn't - how much is being paid. If illegals are paid minimum wage then there is no threat to american workers (unless the illegals do the job a lot better in which case the american workers SHOULD lose out on jobs to a better worker at the same pay rate)