BURLINGTON (Vermont) FREE PRESS

February 25, 2007

Illegal workers use fake IDs, Social Security numbers to get Vermont jobs

By Sam Hemingway
Free Press Staff Writer

Illegal Mexican immigrants coming to Vermont to work on dairy farms show their new employers authentic-looking Social Security cards and other identification documents that are fakes, a Vermont migrant worker advocate said Friday.

"They have fake IDs," said Cheryl Mitchell of the Addison County Migrant Workers Coalition. "The reality is that everyone knows these folks are undocumented."

According to news reports and immigration experts, the fake paperwork is available for sale in immigrant neighborhoods along the United States-Mexico border. Often, the number on the Social Security card for sale is either fictitious or belonged to someone else.

Mitchell said the farmers do not have the authority to challenge the authenticity of a prospective worker's Social Security card or other documents. As a result, they pay a share of the Social Security tax for workers even though the workers likely won't be eligible to receive the benefit later in life.

"These workers are actually helping to shore up the Social Security system," Mitchell said. There are believed to be 12 million illegal immigrants in the United States, half of them from Mexico. An estimated 2,000 Mexicans work on Vermont dairy farms.

Mitchell made her remarks one day after Gov. Jim Douglas acknowledged during a Thursday news conference that Vermont dairy farms employ illegal Mexican immigrants. He also said he didn't know whether four Mexicans working on a Middlebury dairy farm owned by his in-laws entered the country illegally.

The Burlington Free Press reported Feb. 18 that the farm employs illegal Mexican immigrants, based on an interview with Ted Foster, a co-owner of the farm. The owners of the farm include the brother of Douglas' wife, Dorothy, and other relatives.

Douglas said the Fosters did not believe the article was a "fair representation" of their situation and "take great issues with the characterization" in the story, but declined to elaborate. The Foster family has not contacted the newspaper to dispute the story, and efforts to reach them last week were unsuccessful.

"I don't know the answer to that," Douglas said in response to a question about whether Foster Brothers Farm employs illegal immigrants. "I'm not naive. I think it's not an unreasonable assumption in the agricultural industry of Vermont that people ... don't have documentation that they can support."

Douglas also said it would be improper for an employer to seek additional proof of worker's citizenship status once the normal identification and Social Security paperwork is provided.

"Well, we're not asked for them when we're employed," Douglas said to a reporter. "You're not suggesting racial-profiling in employment, I hope?" He said the solution to the problem of illegal workers is for Congress to pass a comprehensive immigration reform law.

Peter Conlon of Middlebury, a dairy labor support specialist for Agri-Placement Services Inc., said the Mexican workers for whom he finds jobs are immigrants who have obtained "green cards," or permanent residency cards, as well as Social Security cards. He said he assumes the paperwork is legal, but isn't able to vouch for its validity.

"Only the federal government can investigate the legitimacy of a green card," he said. "If the documents presented to you look legitimate, as an employer you don't have a choice but to accept them."

He said he has helped 65 Mexicans find work in the Northeast. In two cases, one in Vermont and another in Maine, he said a person he had helped place was later detained. In both cases, it turned out that the person's paperwork was not legitimate.

Michael Lassiter, a spokesman for the Social Security Administration, said in fiscal 2004 the Social Security fund took in $9.5 billion in payments -- up from $7 billion in 2003 -- based on Social Security numbers that did not match up with the names given as holders of the cards.

"We can't account for how much of that is from people who are here illegally or the result of a mix-up because of a change of name after a marriage or a typographical error in spelling a person's name," he said.

Lassiter said the Social Security Administration will often send letters to the employee in question when it discovers a discrepancy. It also notifies an employer when the discrepancy involves 10 or more workers connected to the same employer.

Ted Foster, in his interview with the Free Press, said his farm had received such notices regarding some of its Mexican workers. "We got a report that said the Social Security numbers they have don't match," Foster said. Ted Foster is Dorothy Douglas' cousin.

Lassiter said the Social Security Administration's letters to employees and employers in such instances ask the recipients to rectify the problem but that his agency does not have the authority to investigate such discrepancies.

He said the Department of Homeland Security has proposed a rule mandating that employers address cases where an employee's Social Security number fails to match up with the person's name, but said no such rule is in effect at present.