In the same week House Republicans rolled out an immigration bill which included border security measures, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Agents turned up at 98 7-Eleven stores in 17 states from coast to coast and the District of Columbia. Their appearance and audit netted 21 arrests and resulted in what ICE officials called the largest immigration action against an employer during the Donald Trump presidency. Derek Benner, acting head of ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations, announced the immigration enforcement action as a harbinger of things to come. “It’s not going to be limited to large companies or any particular industry – big, medium and small,” according to Benner.
Benner also warned: “We need to make sure that employers are on notice that we are going to come out and ensure that they’re being compliant. For those that don’t, we’re going to take some very aggressive steps in terms of criminal investigations to make sure that we address them and hold them accountable.”
What this means is employers need to be ever more vigilant to help ensure they are strictly hiring legal workers, that is, those who are authorized to legally work in the U.S. and can prove it.