GovernmentExecutive.com

The Homeland Security Department's budget for 2007 anticipates that employers will be required to verify the immigration status of their workers, according to officials and recently released documents.

Companies can currently voluntarily check the legal status of workers through the Basic Pilot employment eligibility verification system, which is managed by DHS' Citizenship and Immigration Services bureau. About 5,000 companies now participate in the program.

But the department expects Congress to pass a temporary worker program this year and to make it mandatory for employers to check the immigration status of employees, said Bill Strassberger, a CIS spokesman.

Accordingly, the department is requesting additional funding in its 2007 budget to establish a mandatory employment eligibility verification program. About $135 million is being requested for the program and for compliance with the 2005 Real ID Act, which requires state driver's license bureaus to verify the status of noncitizens before issuing federally recognized documents.

The 2007 budget seeks about $2 billion overall for CIS. The bureau got about $1.9 billion for fiscal 2006.

The House passed a border security bill last December that would require employers to check the legal status of their workers. The House bill does not include a program allowing migrants to legally enter the country for work.

The Senate is expected to take up its version of the legislation in the next few months, and is likely to approve a temporary worker program, setting up tough conference negotiations.

DHS heavily supports such a program and is working with members of Congress to get one enacted. But Homeland Security spokesman Russ Knocke would not say the department's position on making it mandatory for employers to verify the status of their workers.

"I'm not going to address a number of the issues we are discussing with Congress in the press," Knocke said. "I'll just tell you that we are committed to strengthening work site enforcement."

DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff also did not directly answer a question during a press conference Monday on whether the department wants to make it mandatory for companies to check the legal status of their employees.

Instead, Chertoff said the department plans to give employers the tools to do so. Companies that are found to knowingly hire illegal immigrants will be punished, the secretary promised.

"We're looking at work site enforcement as a two-part strategy," Chertoff said. "One part is giving employers increased ability to verify the status of their workers. But the second part is to hold them increasingly accountable, and be tougher about what we expect them to do and be tougher with the sanctions that we apply to them if they don't do what's expected."

The department also plans to overhaul CIS business practices in order for the agency to handle new responsibilities as part of a temporary worker program.

The 2007 budget request seeks $112 million for a CIS business transformation program. "The reforms are going to be extensive," Strassberger said.

CIS also plans to continue reforming its fee structure, according to the budget proposal.

"Along with transforming its business processes, redesigning forms and improving service delivery and value to its customers, USCIS will reform its fee structure to ensure the recovery of operational costs in line with federal fee guidelines," the budget states.

"This effort becomes even more important as USCIS operations are automated, forms are reduced and simplified, and USCIS prepares to take on substantial new activities including the president's temporary worker program and a mandatory employment eligibility verification system."