ICE Was Not Meant to Be Cold: The Case for Civil Rights Monitoring of Immigration Enforcement at the Workplace

20 Pages Posted: 2 Dec 2011

See all articles by Kati L. Griffith

Kati L. Griffith

Cornell University - School of Industrial and Labor Relations

Date Written: December 2, 2011

Abstract

In Monitoring Immigration Enforcement, Professor Stephen Lee proposes a framework that empowers the Department of Labor (“DOL”) to monitor the workplace actions of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”). His proposal addresses ICE’s all-too-often myopic focus on aggressive workplace-based immigration enforcement at the expense of its “secondary” consideration for employees’ workplace protections. This Response Essay illuminates that Congress intended worker protections to be primary to the federal government’s workplace-based immigration enforcement scheme. In other words, ICE was not meant to be “cold” with respect to employees’ workplace protections. In particular, the Response Essay exposes Congress’s view that civil rights are a fundamental aspect of IRCA’s scheme. While Professor Lee’s extensive focus on the DOL is certainly justified, my focus on workplace protections that are not within the DOL’s purview brings an additional labor agency into the forefront of the immigration monitoring mix. Indeed, a close examination of congressional intent illustrates that the main federal agency in charge of civil rights in the workplace, the Equal Employment Opportunities Commission (“EEOC”), should play a key role in monitoring ICE’s workplace-based enforcement actions. It also reveals that the EEOC should simultaneously educate both employers and employees about employees’ civil rights protections in the immigration enforcement context.

Suggested Citation

Griffith, Kati L., ICE Was Not Meant to Be Cold: The Case for Civil Rights Monitoring of Immigration Enforcement at the Workplace (December 2, 2011). Arizona Law Review, Vol. 53, p. 1137, 2011, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1967633

Kati L. Griffith (Contact Author)

Cornell University - School of Industrial and Labor Relations ( email )

Ithaca, NY 14853-3901
United States

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