Overview: New Immigration Laws in the California Workplace
The California legislature has passed a number of the employment bills that Governor Brown has signed into law. Most of these new laws are related to the wages, hiring practices, immigration, and some other workplace protection. Each and every employee should be aware of the new workplace laws to ensure that are not violating those laws that will be subjected to a huge penalty.
These laws are effective from 1st January 2018. The new law might not be that helpful for the employees as they have to comply with the federal immigration law obligations while obeying the state laws. Any violation will make them spend huge penalties. In this article, we will focus on the five aspects of the new law.
Can employers give voluntary content to immigration enforcement agents to enter non-public areas?
No, the employer will not have that jurisdiction. The new laws will restrict the employers to give consent to immigration enforcement officers to enter the non-public areas of any workplace unless it is required by the federal law. Besides, the employers cannot give them consent to access or review the records of the employee without a judicial warrant. But this prohibition will not be applied to the to I-9 Employment Verification form.
What will be the judicial right of the affected employees?
The employers must send notice to the affected employees about the inspections of the Employment Eligibility Forms for Verification and any other required documents conducted by an immigration agency. The notice needs to be sent within 72 hours. The notice will be written in the same language that the employer uses to communicate with that employee.
Does the employer need to re-verify the eligibility of the current employee?
The employers will not be allowed to re-verify the employment eligibility of the current employees at a time. It is not demanded by the federal law. The employers only need to handover the notice about the verification within 72 hours.
Is there any penalty?
Yes, there will be a huge penalty for the violation of these laws. Therefore, all the employees and employers should ensure they are in compliance with the new federal law.
What will be the amount of the penalty?
The penalty will vary from the $2, 000 to $5,000 for the first violation. It will be $5000 up to $10, 000 for the subsequent violations.
All these new laws might not be favorable to the employees. In case, they fail to obey these laws that will cost them a huge amount and they will have to pay more in the penalty for every subsequent violation. A better understanding of the laws will help to avoid those penalties and to be on a safe side.
Photo Credit: cgstock / Shutterstock.com