Following the Supreme Court’s split decision last month regarding Arizona’s 2010 immigration law known as S.B. 1070, three principles are clear:
- The federal government’s role in setting immigration policy supersedes the efforts of all states in this area;
- Despite the decision, certain state immigration laws requiring employers to enroll in E-Verify will remain in operation until the federal government says otherwise; and,
- The stage is set for a comprehensive reform of existing immigration law by the federal government sometime in 2013 regardless of who is elected as the country’s next president.
This coming fall, the Department of Homeland Security may release its updated version of the Form I-9.
The new form is likely to be 80 percent larger than before, increasing from a five-page document to nine pages and will include several changes over the previous version. While some of the proposed (but not yet finalized) changes aim to improve the employee verification process, others can complicate the process.
Moreover, a few of the changes are even controversial.
