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This Speakout has not been edited.

By Robert Hardaway

When recently asked whether her proposal to require employees to have proof of health insurance would extend universal health care coverage to illegal immigrants, Hilary Clinton answered with a simple “no.”

Aside from the fact that excluding 20-30 million illegal immigrants from health coverage would make a mockery of the label “universal” to describe her plan, this answer was almost certainly compelled, since providing health care to all American citizens would be challenge enough; providing health care to every person in the entire world who manages to cross U.S. borders illegally, not a difficult feat today, is quite another.

It is now no secret that the failure of President Reagan’s 1986 bill granting amnesty to illegal immigrants can be directly traced to the failure of the government to establish social security verification procedures in order to insure that employees who hired future illegal immigrants would be prosecuted and punished.

As a result there are now millions of illegal immigrants in the U.S. working a jobs which they obtained by forging government issued identification documents such as social security cards, in violation of state felony forgery laws and U.S. Code 18-1028(a) (6) which makes it a crime punishable by five years imprisonment for any person to “knowingly possess an identification document ... that is ... an identification document ... of the U.S. ... produced without lawful authority knowing that such document was ... produced without such authority” — that is, a felony. In U.S. v. Quinteros, a federal court held that social security cards were indeed “identification documents” as defined in that statute.

Without a social security verification procedure in place, employers greedy to exploit cheap illegal labor have been virtually impossible to prosecute since they can always claim that they had no way of knowing that the social security card presented to them by a job applicant was in fact a counterfeit produced by an act of felony forgery.

Despite the fact that such a social security verification procedure would be no more difficult to implement than current credit card verification procedures currently in place to protect credit card companies from fraud and which cost only pennies per transaction to implement, supporters of giving amnesty to those who committed felony forgery have thus far managed to forestall the implementation of any such social security verification procedure. And for very good reason: it would actually work, and immediately stanch the flow of illegal immigration, obviating the need for walls, raids, arrests, or deportation of illegal immigrants. Without jobs, illegal immigrants would self-deport, since in the vast majority of cases, such illegal immigrants came for the jobs in the first place.

Under such a verification procedure, an employer would be required to submit the social security number of an applicant to a central data bank, which would confirm not only the validity of the number, but the age, birthplace, sex, and mother’s maiden name of the valid holder of that social security number, while preserving the privacy of the valid holder. Within minutes, the data bank would provide an authentication number to the employer, who could then use that validation as a defense to any claim that it had knowingly hired an illegal immigrant. Those who hired illegal immigrants without such validation would be subject to severe punishment, which to be effective should go far beyond modest “fines” (now simply paid by employers as a cost of doing business), and include substantial jail terms commensurate with the punishments set forth in the U.S. code for felony forgery.

But until such social security verification procedures are implemented by the pro-amnesty lobby, Hilary’s proposed “universal” health care proposal may accomplish the same result. While it is now ridiculously easy for an illegal immigrant to forge a social security card, it would be far more difficult for a job applicant to prove that he is covered by health insurance or qualified for employer-provided health insurance (which can easily cost 1000.00 a month, far more than can be covered by a minimum wage job) as required by the Hilary plan.

So it may be that those who advocate both universal health care and amnesty for immigrant felons can have one or the other. But not both.

Robert Hardaway is Professor of Law at the University of Denver Sturm College of Law, and the author of fourteen books on law and public policy.

READER COMMENTS

About emergency room care and illegals

My daughters friend ..his mother came from

Morraco, they are pretty well off financially,
yet she flew to the USA with breast cancer, went thru chem,radiation,etc all at the expense of American taxpayers..then
flew back home. Saved a bundle of cash
coming to America. Nice isn't it? (sarcasm)
Emergeny rooms can't turn away illegals?
Why not change laws..it's been said that
our world is changing and we must accept
the NEW change and the NEW IMMIGRANTS,
Why not also change our laws and clarify ,
them all, like the 14 Ammendment that has to do with slavery and not anchor babies.
Change laws, enforce them, and clarify them.

I'm tired of Billary. Because of her husband, I've seen this movie before. Haven't you ever had a boss or co-worker like her who uses everything from their well-honed chameleon-speak, to their "poor me I'm a woman" (while I claw your eyes out?)

Even in her latest outreach to black women at churches - please, spare us, Billary. I'd rather have an honest person respectfully disagree with my beliefs than the hand-shaker that tells me what they think I want to hear, then wants to be in the group photo.

I'd never choose a friend like her...I need girlfriends who say what they mean and mean what they say, and even more a President who does the same.

Heard it before. Yeah yeah yeah. What ev.

"So it may be that those who advocate both universal health care and amnesty for immigrant felons can have one or the other. But not both"
------

Are you kidding? Did you see the dem. "debates" the other night? Remember, you're talking about Hillary here. Hillary. She'll lay claim to and own both sides of the argument at the very same time. And if you don't have a Tim Russert around to help keep her "honest" (Ok, so Tim's not God), then she'll get away with it too!

The obvious effect that illegals have on social spending is being ignored here. The closing of emergency rooms due to governmental interference in the medical marketplace (requiring treatment of non-paying criminals) is a demonstration of what will happen with public schools and other social spending in our society. If the government fails it's primary mission of protecting citizens from criminals, then the citizens are justified in protecting themselves - even if it means voting against ALL social spending in favor of private options that provide a true choice to the consumer.

Sounds like a win-win for the legal workforce to me. Alternative A (universal health care) -all legal workers will have access to health care - and stop having to subsidize all but true emergency care for illegals (do you really think it is appropriate for anyone to go to the emergency room because they have the flu). Alternative B: employers will have to prove that their workforce is legal - probably raising base wages, allowing more LEGAL workers to afford health care - and causing illegals to leave (or do you honestly believe that they'd stay with neither jobs nor health care).

You will immediately be able to tell which businesses truly believe in a level playing field by their stance on universal health care. After all, those countries which big businesses tend to offshore jobs to have universal healthcare of some sort or other which lowers those companies cost of business (meaning if implemented, the companies would no longer get to whine about health care costs impacting their bottom line). Those companies hiring illegals tend either not to offer health coverage - or offer it at such a cost to the workers that only upper management can afford it, offloading the cost to the taxpayers as part of Medicaid/SCHIP coverage. Seems to me that companies opposed to lowering the cost of health care for their workers have "outed" themselves as enemies of the legal workforce - and their goods & services should be boycotted by the legal workforce.

As far as those of you who are concerned that governmental "interference" would lower the quality of healthcare - I have 3 points.
1) Those countries which have universal health care have longer life spans and better infant mortality rates - all at a lower percentage of their gross domestic product (so you are already paying more for healthcare in hidden ways)
2) If a worker has coverage which follows him/her instead of being associated with the corporate labor pool, that employee isn't stuck in a job for healthcare coverage simply because that person or a covered dependent develops long term health care issues (such as cancer, diabetes, etc) which often health insurers deny coverage for as being a pre-existing condition. In addition, the effect of that person's health issues would be spread over a larger "pool", lowering their risk rating.
3) Do you honestly believe that a corporation which is in business to make a profit as all health insurers are has the patient's best interests at heart? Their mission is to collect as much as possible while paying out as little as possible - which leads to wonderful results like that of the woman in Texas who murdered all her children while suffering from post-partum depression when the insurance company CHOSE to save money by putting her on a cheaper (but clearly less effective) medication. And if governmentally covered health care is such a bad deal, why does Congress have a platinum health care plan at taxpayer expense - which members get to keep as part of their retirement (even when they are in the Medicare age group)?

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