July 23, 2009
DOL Deputy Secretary Cinta Kaipat issued the
10th Interim Labor Report to the CNMI Legislature. I reviewed some of the past interim reports and concluded that they are used more to push and defend the administration's agenda then as accurate and factual reports. Past reports have contained snarky comments directed at federal officials, advocates, guest workers and CNMI legislators.
The latest report doesn't even make the effort that the past reports have made to disguise the true purpose of the report. It contains some statements that are even more ridiculous and outrageous than those in previous reports, and more excuses for not being capable of providing basic functions such as providing due process, accurate record keeping, tracking, and statistics and data.
There are also a couple of digs taken at the guest workers such as the suggestion that "if the principal objective of the worker is to remain in the Commonwealth, there is little incentive for counsel to move the case along" referring to the 51 labor cases presently in Superior Court. I would guess that the ripped off, cheated workers spent money and time hiring an attorney to file a court case because they want the thousand of dollars owed to them, not because they "want to remain in the Commonwealth."
Unable to track foreign workers
Much of the report is devoted to defending the failure of DOL and the Division of Immigration to accurately track the foreign contract workers and other nonresidents. The ridiculous statements made to defend the Department of Labor's complete failure and refusal to keep accurate, up-to-date records and statistics on actual foreign contract workers rather than transactions are insulting to anyone who has even the tiniest ability to reason and the least amount of common sense. Clearly, this entire section of the report was meant to deceive and to give credence to DOL's previous statements (also utterly ridiculous) to federal officials and Rep. Sablan who inquired about statistics.
DOL appears to consider counting
transactions more important than counting actual
people. Why keep track of people? That would make too much sense. There is absolutely ludicrous reasoning throughout the entire section. Here are the report's first three of eight points they outlined regarding this issue:
First, the Labor Department collects and publishes data on certain of its transactions. Those transactions are the receipt of applications (payment of fees) and the issuance of permits for applications that are accepted.
Second, the Department has always, going back to 1985, collected and published these statistics. The Department has always, going back to 1985, counted transactions, not people.
Third, population numbers (how many people) are quite different from transaction numbers (how many payments). One foreign worker may have several permit transactions in a given year. The worker’s entry permit may be renewed; the worker’s contract may be amended; the worker may be subcontracted; and so on. Our system counts each of these transactions; it does not count people.
They truly expect the public to believe that the computer can be programmed to track only transactions, but not people?
Blaming the U.S. Census
No DOL or Fitial Administration report, testimony, or statement would be complete without peppering it with some insults and blame on the U.S. This report claims that the U.S. does not publish overstayer lists and the U.S. Census is responsible for keeping CNMI immigration statistics, not DOL.
In every city, every town, every school system, every district in the mainland accurate statistics and records are kept on people. Several times a year when writing grants, I use statistics that were tabulated annually by the city, county, school district, and the Florida Department of Education. No such records are kept in the CNMI according to Kaipat.
From the report:
Sixth , the function of counting the number of people in all categories, including foreign workers, is the responsibility of the U.S. Census Bureau. Census conducts a person-by-person count every 10 years, and conducts sampling counts for various specialized purposes each year and sometimes each month or calendar quarter. This sampling work is used to keep the census numbers completely up to date. However, in the Commonwealth and other territories, Census does not do this sampling work. In the Commonwealth, for example, Census did a partial sample in 2005 and then never provided the funding to do the complete statistical analysis of the sample. So the Commonwealth is left with very old data until the next decennial census in 2010. I have attached to this report one example of the up-to-date statistics that Census provides all other places in the U.S. except the territories. As a result of the lack of attention from Census, we do not know how many U.S. citizens are residing in the Commonwealth; we do not know how many U.S. citizens left the Commonwealth and took up residence in the States last year; we do not know how many people are in the “immediate relative of a U.S. citizen” category; we do not know how many children of foreign workers we have in our public schools; and the list goes on and on. It is very difficult to govern well without the necessary data.
The U.S. Census conducts a
population and housing count every ten years primarily for the purposes of determining Congressional seats, electoral votes and federal funding. They also conduct an
economic census every five years and an
"American Community Survey" or sampling census annually. Census figures are supplemented in most U.S. localities with other population counts for accurate data and statistical purposes. The census is not for the purposes of keeping ongoing statistics that DOL and Immigration should be maintaining to track the foreign contract workers. While I agree that the U.S. Census should apply the same sampling and data collection in the territories as in the mainland, that is not an excuse for DOL and the Division of Immigration to refuse to also collect and maintain accurate data on the population including the incoming and outgoing foreign contract workers and other nonresidents, as is done in other localities.
DOL and the Division of Immigration should be able know how many workers are present in the CNMI on any given day. We are not talking about 1,000,000 people, 500,000 people or even 20,000 people. How difficult can this be?
According to Kaipat, PSS and CNMI schools don't even register students and keep statistics on students. That is incredible! I have never heard of a school district that does not keep statistics. How does the school system get federal grants and federal funding? Seriously, it would take me only a matter of days to come up with a system to gather data and statistics on CNMI school children.
If is it "difficult to govern without the necessary data" then why not create a comprehensive system to collect the data as other municipalities do?
Lack of Funds
All of the blame for the CNMI's dysfunctional system can't be blamed on the U.S. Census, so the report blamed some on the lack of funds:
Our new automation system is efficient and cost-effective, but it does not generate a wide range of data. If we had more funding, we could provide more data. We don’t have the funding, so we cannot provide more data. The need for data simply cannot compete with the need for police services, education services, and health services in our very limited Commonwealth budget.
With an estimated $6,000 in labor fees just from the $50 renewal fee collected on some days they can't afford to update the LIDS system? I would like to see an audit of DOL. If the CNMI has $400,00 (or whatever amount) of money to spend on a lawsuit to sue the federal government, then why doesn't it have money to update the system?
Prior Claims about Effectiveness of LIIDS
According to
DOL's 2008 Annual Report, the tracking system, LIIDS (Labor and Immigration Identifications System), was transferred from the Division of Immigration to DOL:
LIIDS, Transfer to Labor: The Department implemented Executive Order 2008-18 on November 1, 2008 and transferred the employees of the former LIIDS Section of the Immigration Division to the re-named LIDS (Labor Identification System) Section of the Department supervised by the Deputy Secretary.
The
Saipan Tribune story states that the system was transferred to the DOL in
"the interest of efficient administration":Fitial, in an Oct. 17 executive order, transferred the CNMI's labor and immigration identification and documentation system from the Division of Immigration to the Labor Department. More commonly known as LIIDS section, the agency in charge of keeping track of guest workers in the CNMI will now be called the Employment Data Section.
Under the governor's order, the EDS will also maintain the border management system for the Division of Immigration for as long as the CNMI government is in control of local immigration functions. The border management system is an automated program that generates a record of all entries to and exits from the Commonwealth.
The governor said the transfer is done in the interest of efficient administration. He noted that the Labor Department recently upgraded its automated processing system and completed its interactive website. The new system is tightly integrated with the data collection and processing currently done by LIIDS.
It is not "efficient administration" if those in running the system cannot disseminate required data. In fact, there appears to be less valuable data coming out of the system than before it was moved.
The article continued:
“This is just internal reorganization effort. The governor believes it is more appropriate to put Labor in charge of the database, given its duties and responsibilities with respect to the foreign workers,” said press secretary Charles P. Reyes Jr.
According to the executive order, all of LIIDS' equipment and data files will be transferred to the Employment Data Section. The supervisor of the LIIDS section will remain in charge of the new agency. All LIIDS personnel who can legally transfer to the Labor Department will also remain employed in their current positions.
The executive order also calls for the transfer of the LIIDS' budget allocation to the new section. However, it says the governor reserves the authority to make personnel-related decisions.
The governor made an executive order putting DOL, (the agency that has conspired with him on the anti-federalization lawsuit), in charge of the immigration tracking system. The order also renamed the system from the Labor and Immigration Identification System, LIIDS, to the Labor Identification System, LIDS.
The executive order also states that the governor reserves the authority to "make personnel-related decisions." Does this means that the governor controls the personnel who are in charge of the data for the purpose of manipulating or withholding information?
This is not the first executive order for LIDS, formerly called LIIDS. In August 2007 Governor Fitial made a previous executive order moving control of LIIDS from the Governor's Office to the Office of the Attorney General. The
Saipan Tribune reported:
In his order, Fitial transferred LIIDS to the AGO's Division of Immigration for organizational purposes. But LIIDS will continue to provide resource data to the Department of Labor.
The governor also transferred all of this office's functions relating to certificates of identity or U.S. passports to the Immigration Division.
According to the governor, the change was necessary for efficient administration.
“The existence of a multitude of offices, agencies, and instrumentalities outside of the principal departments has resulted in duplication of functions, overlaps of responsibility, lack of coordination, and other forms of inefficient administration,” he said.
Also, in August 2007
Governor Fitial testified before the House Subcommittee on Insular Affairs saying this about the LIIDS system (emphasis added):
The Commonwealth's commitment and institutional ability to maintain an effective system of immigration control is evidenced by its implementation of a computerized arrival and departure tracking system. Financed by the federal government, the Border Management System has been fully operational since 2003, with the entry and departure of each traveler recorded. The Commonwealth also operates the Labor and Immigration Identification System, which records the immigration entry permits to the various classes of immigrants entering the CNMI. We are currently reevaluating these computerized systems to determine whether their components should be updated or replaced to reflect the advances in technology over the past decade. Even within their limitations, however, these systems give local immigration officials controls that their federal counterparts do not have.
The governor testified that the entry and exit of people was recorded since 2003. Where are the statistics? Was his testimony a lie to convince the federal officials that the local system could track foreigners? Or is the data being hidden?
It was convicted felon,
Mark Zachares, former Secretary of CNMI Labor and Immigration, who was the initial spokesman for LIIDS. Working under former Governor Froilan Tenorio, he claimed that the tracking system would stop the federal government from taking over immigration. From the
Saipan Tribune:
Mark D. Zachares, secretary of the Department of Labor and Immigration, said the BMS is a final step of the immigration reforms implemented by the Tenorio administration.
The efforts are aimed at convincing the federal government that CNMI can handle its own labor and immigration laws as provided under the Covenant that established the islands as U.S. commonwealth.
"This system will be the envy in the Pacific... and around the world," the DOLI chief said during a demonstration of how the system works.
Accurate and faster.
...According to Mr. Zachares, the department will hook up with federal agencies, such as the Immigration and Naturalization Service, as well as Interpol to boost the ability of the CNMI to keep away undesirable aliens.
Because it also records departures, he said aliens who are overstaying can be traced easily and their number can be established much more accurately.
"We will be able to use it as an effective law enforcement tool," the DOLI secretary added.
Funded through a $1.5 million grant from the Office of Insular Affairs, the computerized tracking system is a component of LIIDS which the CNMI government vouched in 1995 to improve handling of local immigration.
Some U.S. lawmakers and federal officials have cited the archaic system at the ports of entry here as reason to extend federal immigration laws to the islands.
Is the expensive system worthless? Meant to track incoming and outgoing aliens, no one in the Fitial Administration seems to be capable of consistently reporting on the data. It is obvious to me, that
they do not want to report the statistics.
In February 2008 Governor Fitial made two announcements. The first announcement was that he appointed his niece, Cinta Kaipat as Deputy Secretary of the Department of Labor. The second announcement was that the government had upgraded the LIIDs system. From the
Saipan Tribune:
Labor director Barry Hirshbein and other Labor officials demonstrated to the media yesterday how they upgraded the Labor and Immigration Identification System with the new installation of a new computer system.
After the demonstration, Labor Secretary Gil M. San Nicolas, Hirshbein, Kaipat, and other Labor officials joined the governor in the news briefing.
Fitial said it took two years for his administration to clean up the mess left over from past administrations.
The governor said with the new computer system the LIIDS system has been upgraded for the first time since 2000.
“We have new equipment and new software. The system came online last week. We recognize the hard work put up in by Tom Torres (LIIDS computer specialist 3) to make this happen and the able assistance of Ron Smith (web master),” Fitial said.
LIDS, formerly LIIDS, was meant to be a state of the art tracking system and was funded by federal money from the Department of Interiors Insular Affairs Office. So what happened? Does it have the capability of tracking the aliens, categorizing them and providing valuable data? Data like the data needed by DHS and DOI to formulate a report that is by law due to Congress by 2010 with recommendations on the status of the foreign workers?
CNMI Law Requires Data on Foreign Workers
The
2008 DOL Annual Report contained this muddy statement:
The number of foreign national workers legally present: As of December 31, 2008, the Department had issued 22,917 permits during 2008 in the 706K (foreign worker) immigration category. (footnote 10) The Department counts only its administrative operations; it does not conduct any census of foreign workers actually present in the Commonwealth. (footnote 11) The number of permits issued is greater than the number of workers present in the Commonwealth at any given point in a typical year because some permit actions are contract amendments or extensions and affect a single worker, some permit holders elect to leave the Commonwealth during the year for personal or employment reasons, some employers implement reductions in force and cancel their “issued” permits for some of their workers; some employers close their businesses entirely and their “issued” permits are cancelled by the Department; and other similar reasons.
Footnote 10: The Department’s published statistics show a total of 23,110 permits issued during 2008 in the 706K (private sector employment) and 706B (CNMI government employment) categories. During 2008, there were 193 permits issued in the 207B category. The remaining permits were in the 706K category.
Footnote 11: The taking of the census with respect to all categories of persons present in the Commonwealth, including foreign workers, is the responsibility of the U.S. Census Bureau.
When the Fitial Administration wants to shift responsibility or conceal the dysfunction of the system, it blames the federal government. Whatever the responsibility of the U.S. Census Bureau may be, that is not the issue. The issue is that PL 15-108, § 4970 requires specific annual reporting on data regarding the number of foreign contract workers employed in the Commonwealth during the year. That information was not included in the 2008 DOL Annual Report in violation of CNMI law.
From PL 15-108:
§ 4970. Required reports.
(a) The Secretary shall prepare and submit to the Governor and the presiding officers of the Legislature the following written reports:
(1) Within one hundred twenty (120) days of the end of the government fiscal year, the Secretary shall prepare an annual report including data regarding the number of foreign national workers employed in the Commonwealth during the year, the citizenship of the workers, the job classifications filled by the workers; data regarding the number of citizens and permanent residents employed in the Commonwealth during the year, the job classifications filled by these employees; and other information as appropriate.
What is DOL's answer as to why they did not follow the law? It can be found in a
letter that Deputy Secretary Kaipat sent to Rep. Sablan who questioned her on the data required under the law. From the letter (emphasis added):
In response to your inquiry dated June 3, 2009, with respect to Public Law 15-108, Section 4970, two points can be made: First, the Secretary is required only to provide data 'regarding" the number of foreign workers. There is no direct mandate to provide exact numbers. That section refers to:
data regarding the number of foreign national workers employed in the Commonwealth during the year, the citizenship of the workers, the job classifications filled by the workers; data regarding the number of citizens and permanent residents employed in the Commonwealth during the year, the job classifications filled by these employees; and other information as appropriate.
The Secretary has provided in both the 2007 and the 2008 Annual Reports the data that he has available regarding the number of workers. That data consists of the number of transactions completed by the Labor Department. The 2008 Annual Reports is consistent with the mandate of PL 15-108.
What a ridiculous response and unbelievable interpretation of the law. I guess the legislature should revise the law to insert the word "exact" because Kaipat, who claims to have been the primary author of the law, states that the mandated report does not call for "exact" data. What kind of law would require inexact data, or faulty data, or non-data? Do attorneys interpret the law this way? Does the Office of the Attorney General?
When interpreting any law it is always helpful to consider the intent. Surely the intent of this provision was to have complete and accurate data on the number of foreign workers and the other reporting requirements.
DOL provided statistical information in the 2007 Annual Report. Why not in the 2008 Annual report? Is it because the statistics could actually help the DOI and DHS in preparing a report to make recommendations on permanent status for the foreign contract workers? The census data was not an issue in 2007.
From this
Saipan Tribune article published two years ago, June 1, 2007:
Thousands of foreign workers may be eligible for permanent residency under the CNMI immigration bill drafted by the federal government.
Data from the Labor and Immigration Identification System show that there are 7,944 guest workers who have been employed in the Commonwealth for five to nine consecutive years.
This figure was based on valid labor permits issued as of May 16, 2007, as well as labor applications pending review. The data did not include those who have worked in the CNMI for 10 years or more.
“That's a lot of workers,” press secretary Charles P. Reyes Jr. said of the figure. “Under the proposed federal law, they would be eligible for permanent residency, similar to the status enjoyed by people from the Federated States of Micronesia.”...
...According to LIIDS, there are 1,014 guest workers who have been on island for five years and 719 for six years. Nonresident workers who have stayed eight years total 4,871. Those who have had nine straight years of employment total 445.
Of the nearly 8,000 guest workers, 5,726 are from the Philippines. Some 1,266 are Chinese, 339 Thai, 150 Japanese, 146 Korean, 118 Bangladeshi, and 102 Nepalese. The 97 others are of different citizenships.
The emphasis was added to show that the LIIDS Sytem worked just fine in 2007. The data was specific.
However, since some of us have questioned this issue, Deputy Secretary Kaipat made a statement in the 10th interim report claiming that the press misinterpreted the information:
Fourth, for many years, the Commonwealth newspapers published “transaction data” and called it “people data.” When the Department published a transaction number (for example, 30,000 permits issued), the newspapers would report there were 30,000 foreign workers. The published data never was people data. It was always transaction data. However, in prior years, the transactions tended to be simpler and fewer. For that reason, the transaction data – while incorrect as a proxy for the number of people – was probably not incorrect by a very large margin. Today, transactions tend to be greater in number as employers seek to adjust to difficult economic circumstances. This means that the transaction data – while still incorrect as a proxy for the number of people – is probably incorrect by a very large margin. In my view, relying on incorrect data is not a good idea. So I have consistently taken the position that the Labor Department’s data is not “population data” and cannot be used for population purposes. We have added explanatory captions and footnotes to the data that we publish to alert users to this limitation.
Are we actually to believe that DOL and Kaipat who spin everything, comment on the press constantly and correct everyone never bothered to correct the newspapers for reporting the data incorrectly?
Statistics Needed by Federal Officials to Decide Status for Foreign Workers
If LIDS has the capability of providing the data and statistics, then is DOL deliberately withholding data to impede the Congress from being able to make a decision on improved status for the foreign workers? Here is what PL 110-229 says is needed for the report to make recommendations:“The Secretary of the Interior, in consultation with the Secretary of Homeland Security, and the Governor of the Commonwealth, shall report to the Congress not later than 2 years after the date of the enactment of the Northern Mariana Islands Immigration, Security, and Labor Act. The report shall include the number of aliens residing in the Commonwealth; a description of the legal status (under Federal law) of such aliens; in five year increments, the number of years each alien has been residing in the Commonwealth; the current and future requirements for the Commonwealth economy of an alien workforce; and recommendations to the Congress related to granting alien workers lawfully present in the Commonwealth on the date of the enactment of such Act United States citizenship or some other permanent legal status.”
LIDS, the federally funded CNMI tracking system, should be able to provide much of the required information. From the report:Fifth, the function of the Labor Department is to ensure that all foreign workers who are in the Commonwealth are properly documented and employed. We carry out that function very well. Our new system allows us to stay completely current with applications and to sift out fraudulent sponsorships or unqualified employers. The Labor Department also reports every quarter on overstayers and publishes a list of those without status to remain in the Commonwealth. With our new system, we have very few errors on those lists. (One might note that the U.S. has no capability to publish any kind of overstayer list.) Many of the people we report as overstayers elect to leave voluntarily once they see their names in the paper. The rest are pursued by the Division of Immigration.
Surely, if the system can track "overstayers" as Kaipat claims, then it should be able to be programmed (if it isn't already) to track all foreign workers and nonresidents.
You may recall that at the May 19, 2009 House Hearing DOI's Nik Pula testified requesting a delay in the report that is due to Congress. He stated:Public Law 110-229 calls for a report and recommendations on the status of long-term foreign workers by the Secretary of the Interior (in consultation with the Secretary of Homeland Security and Governor of the CNMI), by May 8, 2010. Specifically, the report will include -
• the number of aliens in the CNMI,
• their legal status,
• the length of the aliens’ stays in the CNMI,
• the CNMI economy’s need for foreign workers, and
• recommendations, if deemed appropriate, whether or not legal foreign workers in the CNMI on May 8, 2008, should be able to apply for long-term status under United States law.
Before recommendations are made, however, we will need information and statistics on the CNMI’s foreign workers. The Department of the Interior, in conjunction with our interagency partners, is considering how best to collect the data and information necessary to complete this report. Title VII of Public Law 110-229 provides discretionary authority for the Secretary of Homeland Security to establish a registration program. It is our understanding that DHS is presently considering whether to implement such a program. Should DHS implement a registration program, sharing of such data would be a useful source of information for the required report.
On May 8, 2008, when Title VII was enacted the transition period effective date was expected to be June 1, 2009, and Interior’s long-term foreign worker report was scheduled for a year later on May 8, 2010. It was believed that after nearly a year of experience with DHS’s administration, we could see how things would unfold for the long-term foreign workers. For example, some may leave of their own accord, some may qualify for DHS’s five-year foreign worker transition program, and some may qualify for adjustment to an immigration status under provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act. It would be prudent to give time for these events and adjustments to take place, before passing judgment on the overall long-term worker issue.
Recently, the Secretary of DHS utilized legislative authority to delay the transition period effective date by 180 days to November 28, 2009. There is, however, no equivalent statutory authority to delay Interior’s report on long-term foreign workers. If there is only five months of administration before the report is due, as the current timeframe would require, insufficient data and other factors may make the completion of a meaningful report difficult. In addition, we are anticipating that status adjustments of some foreign workers will need to be made, potentially increasing the time it will take to complete the report beyond the one year originally allowed for in Public Law 110-229. These factors may make it difficult for Interior and its partners to parse desirable immigration policy and long-term foreign worker issues in an abbreviated timeframe.
The Department of the Interior, therefore, requests that the Congress extend the statutory date for the report on long-term foreign workers by one year to May 8, 2011.
I stated in a previous post:The federal government knew what deadlines the law specified a year ago, and knew what statistics and data were needed to compile the required report. A year after the law has passed is late to be worrying about how a deadline will be met. The federal agencies charged with making recommendations in the form of a report to Congress by May 8, 2010 need to get to work immediately, organize with the other federal agencies, and gather the statistics and data instead of proposing a delay. The federal government could use GAO experts, hire an outside consultant or firm, or have DHS begin registration of nonresidents to compile needed data. A delay in the report will perpetuate needless uncertainty and hardship for all of the nonresidents, and for the community at large.
A June 15, 2009 letter addressed to the Secretaries of the Department of Interior and the Department of Homeland Security from Senator Bingaman, Chairman of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, ranking committee member Senator Lisa Murkowski, Chairwoman of the House Subcommittee on Insular Affairs, Oceans, and Wildlife Congresswoman Madeleine Bordallo and Congressman Gregorio Kilili Sablan also rejected the idea of a delay. The letter was written to "urge swift and coordinated implementation of Title VII of P.L. 110-229."
From the letter:This law was signed over a year ago to extend U.S. immigration laws to the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) with special provisions to respond to local conditions. The CNMI is currently in a serious economic downturn and the delays and uncoordinated implementation of Federal immigration laws further undermines the fragile local economy. We are opposed to any further delay to the start of the transition period, and to submission of the Interior Department's report on aliens residing in the CNMI.
There are many challenges to overcome in implementing this law. However, your responsibility is to carry out the law according to the schedule set forth in the statute and consistent with congressional intent. We urge you to review the Government Accountability Office report, "Managing Potential Economic Impact of Applying US. Immigration Law Requires Coordinated Federal Decisions and Additional Data" (GAO-08-79 1 ) and implement its recommendations - establish an interagency process to jointly implement the legislation and to jointly develop strategies to obtain critical data. We are concerned that recent DHS testimony failed to indicate any commitment to conducting the alien registration called for in the law, that the DOI requested a one-year delay to report on aliens, and that the position of Federal Labor Ombudsman in the CNMI was vacant for six months.
From this letter and from conversations that I have had with staffers and federal officials, it does not look like Congress would agree (or could agree given the time span) to introduce and pass legislation that would be needed to extend this provision. The letter asks for action including:Specifically, we ask for your commitment to prompt action on the following:
Establish a formal interagency coordinating process among DOI, DHS, and DOL to:
(1) Define each agency's role in implementation;
(2) Gather needed information including reasonable estimates of the composition and immigration status of CNMI residents; current and future labor needs and sources, and the composition and activities of alien investors; and
(3) Establish timelines for agency decisions and regular interagency meetings.
It appears that the federal government will handle the job of gathering statistics and data on the guest workers. Isn't the fact that the CNMI could never track the foreign workers one argument for the federal takeover?
The DOL interim labor reports clarify the urgent need to get rid of the broken local system. Whatever else is in the regulations that DHS proposes for the transitional guest worker program, I hope they have sense enough to totally revamp the system and not just grant powers to the corrupt DOL officials to allow them to continue running the dysfunctional system.
09 W. L. Doromal
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