Part of California Takes On Illegal Hiring

New York Times reports that: Protests erupted across Southern California last year when Arizona adopted its tough immigration law: immigrant rights advocates staged rallies in cities like San Diego and Santa Barbara; Los Angeles severed economic ties with Arizona. But just 50 miles east of Los Angeles, a handful of cities have started crackdowns similar to those in Arizona on businesses that hire illegal immigrants. In what may be the single most Democratic state in the country, with a huge, fast-growing Latino population, the area known as the Inland Empire — a sprawl of suburbs, old and new — has emerged as a pocket of ideological resistance in a state that has grown increasingly averse to crackdowns on immigration. Late last month, Murrieta became the fifth Inland Empire city to require all businesses to check the legal status of new employees with E-Verify, an online federal government system designed to confirm employment eligibility. Businesses that do not comply could lose their licenses.