On October 28th, President Obama signed the Department of Homeland Security appropriations bill for fiscal year 2010, extending E-Verify through September 30, 2012. The bill passed the house on October 15th and the Senate on the 20th.
Passage of this bill is consistent with the Administration’s stated intention to eventually make E-Verify mandatory for all employers (as we reported in April of this year).
E-Verify is an online system dependent upon the Form I-9 that is intended to allow employers to verify the employment authorization of newly hired employees.
Completing I-9s correctly when there are out-of-state employees or employer locations in different states is a challenge for many companies. Unfortunately, there is no easy answer to this problem. The solution that will work best for your company depends upon the company set up and practices. To restate the I-9 basics, the employer must review original documents and complete the I-9 correctly and in a timely manner – there is no way around these requirements even for out-of-state offices or employees. If new out-of-state hires are not brought to a main office to complete paperwork, you must have an out-of-state employer representative or agent reviewing original documents. The completion timeline still holds as well; employees must complete Section 1 of the I-9 by the close of business on their first day, and employers have until the third business day to review original documents and complete Section 2. Is your company compliant? If you have concerns, or questions about instituting policies and procedures that will work for your company, please 
It appears that the 
In case you haven’t seen it yet, the USCIS released supplemental E-Verify guidance specifically for Federal Contractors. This 22-page document can be found 
Recent reports indicate businesses have been receiving a new type of letter from the Social Security Administration. These letters state that the business has been selected randomly to take part in a Social Security Administration study and request information about specific employees. The letters include questions about the employees’ original employment applications, Social Security Numbers and documents. If your company receives one of these letters, please proceed carefully and consult with legal counsel before responding. In addition to labor law and immigration law considerations, privacy issues and potential fraud should also be considered.
Last Friday, a Missouri poultry processing company paid $450,000 in administrative fines following a 2007 worksite enforcement investigation. The fine will be used by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to fund future enforcement activities. In addition to the fine, the settlement requires the company to train all Human Resources personnel, and set up company compliance policies to ensure that all Immigration laws are followed. In the 
Starting today the government will begin including a clause in all qualifying federal contracts requiring the use of E-Verify. They may also begin to amend existing contracts, if the contracts meet the qualifying criteria. As mentioned in our 
Employers who have sponsored employees for H-1B visas should be aware that the Department of Homeland Security / U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has been conducting random, unannounced, on-site inspections. Reports indicate that the USCIS Administrative Site Visit and Verification Program will visit 20,000 sites in an attempt to uncover fraud and abuses of the H-1B program. 
What is happening on September 8, 2009?
The 
