WASHINGTON, D.C. - Ways and Means Social Security Subcommittee Chairman Michael R. McNulty (D-NY) delivered the following opening statement during today’s subcommittee hearing on employment eligibility verification systems (E-verify) and their impact on the Social Security Administration (SSA):
“Today’s hearing will examine E-Verify, a pilot program that verifies whether employees are work authorized, which is operated jointly by the office of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services at the Department of Homeland Security, and the Social Security Administration. We hope to learn more about how the pilot program currently operates and the serious obstacles that must be overcome before the use of a verification system could be made mandatory for every employer across the nation.
“More important for this Subcommittee, we will examine how the Social Security Administration, and the people it serves, would be affected by implementation of a mandatory system.
“Our primary concern is whether SSA field offices would be able to handle the massive new workload that would arise, should the current pilot project be expanded quickly and without substantial improvements.
“We already know that there are errors in the SSA databases on which E-Verify relies. These errors generally do not interfere with the administration of Social Security. But these errors do generate erroneous rejections in a verification system. And the burden of correcting these errors will fall most heavily on U.S. citizens.
“Under the current, voluntary pilot, about 7 percent of the inquiries into E-Verify are rejected because the worker’s data does not match the information in SSA’s databases. In order to keep their jobs, these individuals will usually need to visit an SSA field office in order to correct SSA’s records. And typically, they must bring with them some sort of certified documentation, such as a birth certificate.
“Under a mandatory verification system, even if only some of these workers showed up in SSA field offices, it would pose a very substantial new burden on SSA - and one that is wholly unrelated to SSA’s core mission of managing the Social Security and Supplemental Security Income programs.
“After years of inadequate funding, SSA is now struggling to bring down an unprecedented backlog of disability claims. At a recent hearing before the full Ways and Means Committee, we heard heartbreaking stories of people who lost their homes, their children, even their lives, as they waited years for a decision on their claim.
“At the same time, lines at SSA field offices grow ever longer, and half of callers into those offices now get a busy signal. Moreover, SSA is facing a wave of retirement and disability claims as the Baby Boom generation begins reaching retirement age.
“Imposing a substantial new immigration-related workload on SSA would potentially swamp the agency and threaten its ability to serve our constituents who rely on Social Security and SSI for basic income.
“For this reason, proposals for mandatory verification that do not realistically address the workload placed on SSA’s shoulders should not be enacted.
“I hope our fact-finding today will help the Subcommittee and the Congress better understand the challenges and consequences of making employment verification mandatory. Today’s testimony about the potential impact on SSA will help to better guide us through the decisions we face about how to deal with this complex issue. But my duty as chairman of this Subcommittee, and my duty to all Americans, is to ensure that whatever we do, it does not harm SSA and the people who rely on it."
