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Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 Acronyms (colloquial) IRCA Nicknames SimpsonMazzoli Act Enactedby the 99th United States Congress Effective Signed into law by Ronald Reagan on November 6, 1986 Citations Public Law Pub.L. 99603 Statutes at Large 100Stat.3445 Legislative history Introduced in the Senate as S. 1200 by Alan K. Simpson on May 23, 1985 Committee consideration by Senate Judiciary, Senate Budget Passed the Senate on September 19, 1985(6930) Passed the House on October 9, 1986(voice vote after incorporating H.R. 3810, passed 230166) Reported by the joint conference committee on October 14, 1986; agreed to by the House on October 15, 1986(238173) and by the Senate on October 17, 1986(6324) Signed into law by President Ronald Reagan on November 6, 1986

The Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA), Pub.L. 99603, 100Stat.3445, enacted November6, 1986, also known as the Simpson-Mazzoli Act, signed into law by Ronald Reagan on November 6, 1986, is an Act of Congress which reformed United States immigration law. The Act[1]

At the time, the Immigration and Naturalization Service estimated that about four million illegal immigrants would apply for legal status through the act and that roughly half of them would be eligible.[2]

Romano L. Mazzoli was a Democratic representative from Kentucky and Alan K. Simpson was a Republican senator from Wyoming who chaired their respective immigration subcommittees in Congress. Their effort was assisted by the recommendations of the bipartisan Commission on Immigration Reform, chaired by Rev. Theodore Hesburgh, then President of the University of Notre Dame.

The law criminalized the act of engaging in a "pattern or practice" of knowingly hiring an "unauthorized alien"[3] and established financial and other penalties for those employing illegal immigrants under the theory that low prospects for employment would reduce undocumented immigration. Regulations promulgated under the Act introduced the I-9 form to ensure that all employees presented documentary proof of their legal eligibility to accept employment in the United States.[4]

These sanctions would apply only to employers that had more than three employees and did not make a sufficient effort to determine the legal status of their workers.

The first Simpson-Mazzoli Bill was reported out of the House and Senate Judiciary Committees. The bill failed to be received by the House, but civil rights advocates were concerned over the potential for abuse and discrimination against Hispanics, growers' groups rallied for additional provisions for foreign labor, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce persistently opposed sanctions against employers.

The second Simpson-Mazzoli Bill finally passed both chambers in 1985, but it came apart in the conference committee over the issue of cost. The year marked an important turning point for the reform effort. Employer opposition to employer sanctions began to subside, partly because of the "affirmative defense" clause in the law that explicitly released employers from any obligation to check the authenticity of workers' documents.

Also, agricultural employers shifted their focus from opposition to employer sanctions to a concerted campaign to secure alternative sources of foreign labor. As opposition to employer sanctions waned and growers' lobbying efforts for extensive temporary worker programs intensified, agricultural worker programs began to outrank employer sanctions component as the most controversial element of reform.

According to one study, the IRCA caused some employers to discriminate against workers who appeared foreign, resulting in a small reduction in overall Hispanic employment. There is no statistical evidence that a reduction in employment correlated to unemployment in the economy as a whole or was separate from the general unemployment population statistics.[5] Another study stated that if hired, wages were being lowered to compensate employers for the perceived risk of hiring foreigners.[6]

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Mayor Bill de Blasioheralded New York City as a strong community of immigrantsin his annual address about the state of the nations most populous municipality Tuesday. He opened his address with a story about his grandmother immigrating from Italy more than 100 years ago and finding success as an entrepreneur and business owner. He also reached out to the city's many Hispanic residents in Spanish and championed economic reforms, including a proposed increase in the citys minimum wage and an expansion of affordable housing.

De Blasio said that growing economic inequality risks changing New York from an immigrant-friendly city of opportunity to a gated community.

For generations, New York has been a city that unleashed human potential -- a place offering opportunity for everyone, no matter how your lifes story began, opportunity for innovators and visionaries to write new chapters in our history, and for parents and grandparents to write brighter ones for the next generation, de Blasio said in the opening of his State of Our City speech.

In a city where more than 37 percent of residents are immigrants, de Blasio has made policies that help to integrate new arrivals and immigrants a central focus of his administration. He also publicly supported Obama administration efforts to push federal immigration reforms that stalled in Congress.

Last month, the mayor launched one of the nations most ambitious municipal identification card programs, IDNYC, offering the card to city residents regardless of their immigration status. On Tuesday, de Blasio said more than 180,000 people had booked appointments to obtain the ID card, which offers access to basic services and cultural institutions.

Critics of IDNYC blasted the program and others like it, dismissing it as a reward for illegal immigration. But de Blasio and other proponents contend the program can improve safety in immigrant communities, providing valid IDfor residents interactions with the NYPD and security personnel in city buildings. Lets be clear: Relegating any New Yorker to life in the shadows is not who we are as a city, de Blasio said in his speech.

De Blasio has joined other Democratic mayors in the U.S. to oppose a lawsuit filed in Texas by Republican governors who claim President Barack Obamas executive actions on immigration are illegal because the GOP-controlled Congress did not approve the measures. In November, Obama offered to defer deportation actions and grant work permits to an estimated 5 million immigrants who are currently living in the U.S. without legal permission. The president had previously deferred deportation for immigrants who were brought to the country illegally as children.

De Blasio also outlined plans to battle economic inequality in the city of more than 8 million residents by seeking an expansion of affordable housing citywide and raising the minimum wage. The mayor said a proposal by state lawmakers -- New Yorks minimum wage will increase to $9 in 2016 -- wasnt enough to impact city residents. Thats why we will fight to raise New York Citys minimum wage to more than $13 per hour next year, de Blasio said, adding that wages would be indexed to bring a projected $15 per hour in four years. Nothing does more to address income equality than actually raising peoples incomes, de Blasio said in his speech.

De Blasio did not directly address his seemingly fractured relationship with the citys police forceafter months of protests over the police killings of unarmed black men in New York and Missouri. The mayor had only praise for the courageous men and women in uniform, whom he said helped reduce the rates of murder, robbery and burglary in the city to an all-time low.

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Immigration Reform 2015: NYC Mayor Advocates For Immigrants In 'State Of Our City' Speech

U.S. Senate Democrats blocked Tuesday a $39.7 billion funding bill for the Department of Homeland Security. The 51-48 vote killed House-passed proposals to undo President Barack Obama's executive actions on immigration, Politico reported. There are just three weeks remaining for Obama and congressional Republicans to hammer out a compromise that funds the agency in charge of protecting U.S. residents from terrorist attacks and regulating immigration, among other functions. DHS only recently emerged as a wedge issue to between the White House and the GOP, whose members want to defund parts of the agency that would carry out Obamas plan to defer deportation for several million undocumented immigrants.

The department will run out of money after Feb. 27, Reuters reported, but the agency would continue its national security functions. Obama, in a cabinet meeting on Tuesday, warned that inaction would endanger the paychecks of front-line federal workers in the agency formed as a response to the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks in New York and Washington.

Homeland Security is made up of 22 different federal departments and agencies that were streamlined to control immigration at the countrys ports and borders and to defend against and respond to terrorist attacks. The agency also manages federal response to man-made and natural disasters. In 2002, after Congress passed the Homeland Security Act, the department became its own, cabinet-level entity. It officially opened its doors on March 1, 2003, according to the DHS website, and soon absorbed the functions of the immigration and naturalization services. Those services were divided into two subagencies, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency is also under DHS. Famously criticized for its response to Hurricane Katrina in 2005, FEMA absorbed the functions of four other disaster response offices. In 2005, DHS began the first of a few rounds of reorganization to further streamline its functions. Today, the DHS boasts a more than 240,000 person work force and had a budget of $39.2 billion for the fiscal year 2014. The president requested $38.2 billion for 2015.

The U.S. House of Representatives last month passed a separate Homeland Security bill that funds everything except the executive actions on immigration. House Speaker John Boehner, a Republican from Ohio, urged the Republican-controlled Senate to pass the measure ahead of Tuesday's vote.

But Democrats stood with Obama who, in his cabinet meeting on Tuesday, stressed the potential risks of sending thousands of national security personnel to work without pay. I talked about this yesterday [and] I want to re-emphasize it today: The Department of Homeland Security contains numerous agencies that, every single day, are keeping the American people safe, Obama said at the top of the meeting, according to a White House pool report. [The employees] need certainty in order to do their jobs. The notion that we would risk the effectiveness of the department that is charged with preventing terrorism and patrolling our borders, making sure the American people are safe makes absolutely no sense.

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Immigration Reform 2015: GOP Plan To Defund Obama Immigrant Actions Could Hurt Department Of Homeland Security, Border ...

WASHINGTON, Feb. 3, 2015 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- We are proud that Democrats and Republicans in the U.S. Senate rejected the attempt to hold the Department of Homeland Security hostage in order to reverse President Obama's executive order on immigration. Protecting immigrants from exploitation and uncalled-for deportation honors the spirit and principle of our nation and can help raise living standards for all workers.

Congress should focus on the country's needs. That means funding the Department of Homeland Security and passing true comprehensive immigration reform rather than using either in a repulsive political game.

As an organization founded by immigrants, LIUNA has long been a fierce advocate for comprehensive immigration reform which secures our borders, provides a path to citizenship, levels the playing field for honest employers and allows everyone in America immigrants and non-immigrants to work free from harassment, intimidation or exploitation.

The half-million members of LIUNA the Laborers' International Union of North America are on the forefront of the construction industry, a powerhouse of workers who are proud to build America.

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SOURCE Laborers' International Union of North America

RELATED LINKS http://www.liuna.org

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Immigration Reform and Homeland Security: Statement of LIUNA General President Terry O'Sullivan

Scammers in one the largest immigrant hubs in the U.S. will now face stiffer penalties for defrauding people who are seeking legal assistance with immigration matters. New York states Immigration Assistance Service Enforcement Act, which went into effect on Monday, establishes new protections and rights for immigrants who use the services of a notario pblico, which are generally individuals or businesses that falsely represent themselves as qualified legal advisers for new arrivals and other citizenship issues. The law makes it a felony to defraud people seeking assistance of more than $1,000.

The effort by immigration reform advocates is designed to protect immigrants from becoming victims of fraud. President Barack Obama in 2012 began taking executive action on immigration, deferring deportation actions against undocumented immigrants who were brought to the U.S. as children and later offering work permits to millions of other people who came into the country illegally, which caused an uptick in reported frauds against immigrants.

Notarios, which traditionally take advantage of cultural differences, are not permitted to give legal advice nor are they licensed to represent cases that are pending in immigration courts or the Department of Labor. They also may not threaten to report undocumented immigrants to authorities over complaints about bad service. In Latin American countries, notario pblico is an attorney or trusted member of the community who is authorized to give legal advice.

All 50 U.S. states and several U.S. territories have some form of protection against this costly fraud, according to the Department of Homeland Security. Last year, the Federal Trade Commissionwon a $616,000 judgment againsta Maryland couple over deceptive immigration services. The agency said it registered 891 complaints of immigration services fraud in 2013.

New Yorks law is unique in that it is the only one to establish permanentlythe state Office of New Americans, which is dedicated to promoting and enhancing the welfare of immigrant communities, according to the New York Immigration Coalition. The Immigration Assistance Service EnforcementAct, for which state Sen. Rubn Daz and Assemblyman Marcos Crespo advocated, was signed into law by Gov. Andrew Cuomo last August.

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Immigration Reform 2015: Law Against Citizenship Scams In New York State Goes Into Effect