INS Questions Nebraska Meatpacking Workers as Part of Operation Vanguard

IMMIGRANTS & EMPLOYMENT

INS Workplace Enforcement

INS QUESTIONS NEBRASKA MEATPACKING WORKERS AS PART OF OPERATION VANGUARD
Immigrants' Rights Update, Vol. 13, No. 3, May 28, 1999

As part of the Immigration and Naturalization Service’s "Operation Vanguard," INS agents on May 5, 1999, went to the Lexington, Nebraska, plant of IBP, Inc., a meatpacking company, to question workers regarding their immigration status. Announced at a September 1999 meeting in Omaha, Operation Vanguard (originally called Operation Prime Beef) is an INS workplace enforcement strategy designed to remove and exclude undocumented workers from the meatpacking industry in Nebraska and Iowa.

The INS had previously reviewed the I-9 employment eligibility verification forms completed by the more than 2,000 workers at the Lexington plant and found "discrepancies" between the information provided by the workers and the information contained in INS, Social Security Administration (SSA), and other data bases. According to one newspaper account, the INS had identified 318 workers whose forms contained such discrepancies whom it wanted to interview at the Lexington plant. However, on the date the INS went to the plant, 185 of these workers were no longer on the payroll. The INS considered these workers to have "voluntarily terminated" their employment. Of the remaining 133 workers whose work papers contained discrepancies and who had been scheduled for interviews, 1 was arrested, 1 was fired, 8 were "no shows," 17 were on excused absences, and 106 were determined to be lawfully employed.

The next day, the INS went to another IBP plant in Gibbon, Nebraska. The INS had placed about 320 workers from this plant on a "discrepancy list," and of this group, 140 workers appeared for their INS interviews. All were cleared to continue working.

According to the INS, Operation Vanguard is intended to "remove the magnet" that draws undocumented workers to the Midwest—i.e., jobs. Rather than auditing the I-9 forms of meatpacking plants on a "piecemeal" basis, Operation Vanguard comprises an industry-wide audit of the meatpacking industry in Nebraska and western Iowa. (A few plants in South Dakota have also been targeted.) The strategy includes efforts by the INS to convince employers to participate in the electronic employment eligibility verification program known as the Basic Pilot Program (recently expanded to Nebraska—see "INS Expands One Employment Verification Pilot and Starts Another," p. 15) and the Social Security number verification program administered by the SSA known as Critical Links. Furthermore, after the initial audit of the meatpacking plants, the INS intends to follow-up with additional audits.

Last fall, the INS subpoenaed the I-9 forms and other employment records of all the meatpacking plants in Nebraska as well as parts of Iowa and South Dakota. The INS cross-referenced the information in these records against INS, SSA, and state and federal departments of labor databases to determine which of the workers had employment authorization.

In all, the INS reported identifying 40 plants that had workers with discrepancies between their work papers and the databases. Of the approximately 24,300 workers in these 40 plants, the INS reported that more than 4,700 of them had discrepancies in their work papers.

The INS placed the names of the workers whose work authorization could not be verified on discrepancy lists that were distributed to employers at another meeting in Omaha in April 1999. Subsequently, the employers set up interviews for workers identified on these discrepancy lists to meet with the INS and discuss their status. The INS also provided the employers a form letter to give to each of the workers on the lists. The letter advises each worker that the INS was not able to verify his or her employment authorization without giving any specifics as to the problem; states that INS will interview the worker at the work site; and informs the worker that, prior to the interview, he or she can contact the INS or the employer with additional documents or information that might clarify the worker’s employment authorization.

After the employers delivered the form letters to the workers on the discrepancy lists, the INS initiated interviews at the meatpacking plants, beginning with the IBP plants in Lexington and Gibbon, Nebraska. Apparently, the INS expected few interviews would actually take place, believing that most of the workers identified with discrepancies would "voluntarily terminate." However, significant numbers of workers identified with discrepancies have appeared for their interviews in Lexington and Gibbon and at other plants that the INS has visited since May 5, 1999, and have been found to be authorized to work.

The INS will continue visiting meatpacking plants through late May and into June 1999 until it has gone to each of the 40 plants where workers with discrepancies in their work papers have been identified. And while Operation Vanguard is currently limited to Nebraska, Iowa and, South Dakota, that is likely to change, since the INS has indicated that it plans to expand the program to include other industries and states.