Bush plan should deal with employers who hire undocumented workers.
May 15, 2006
Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Jean Hay Bright of Dixmont, Maine, said Monday night she was disappointed President George Bush said little about actually enforcing the laws pertaining to the hiring of undocumented workers.

"The major problem here is one of employers, not of workers," Hay Bright said in response to Bush's address to the nation on the issue of immigration. "We already have laws on the books making it illegal for employers to hire undocumented workers."

A national high-tech identity card for legal, documented workers, as President Bush proposed, does not address the problem of employers willfully ignoring American labor and tax laws, Hay Bright said, adding "this is especially a serious problem in the hiring of temporary and day laborers."

"The Social Security system and the IRS are the key to this. What we need is a verification system similar to that of credit card companies, where Social Security numbers or IRS ID numbers for private contractors can be verified quickly and simply, by phone or over the internet," the candidate said.

Hay Bright said she was also disappointed that the president continued to perpetuate the myth that there are jobs that Americans won't do.

"We all know Americans would take those jobs if they were paid a living wage," Hay Bright said. "We make the federal minimum wage a living wage, and I predict Americans and legal workers will gladly take those jobs."

For more on the candidate's position on immigration see http://www.jeanhaybright.us/immigration.html.