STATE OF CALIFORNIA. MOVES OFFICIALLY AGAINST I.C.E.

by Bob Walsh

The State Labor Commissioner of the formerly great state of California, Julie Su, acted last month to direct her staff to refuse I.C.E. access to facilities controlled by her department unless those officers have a warrant.

In several cases within the last year ICE agents have attempted to attend hearings where investigators from the S.L.C. discuss claims with workers and their employers. Last year the state Dept. of Industrial Relations investigated 22 complaints from workers that asserted their employers had threatened them with deportation. That number has approximately doubled this year.

Both the State Superintendent of Public Instruction and the Chief Justice of the State Supreme Court have voiced problems with I.C.E. agents pursuing illegal aliens in or near their bailiwicks.

Ms. Su has distributed a 27 page memo to her department last month. It includes a script for appropriate responses by employees when interacting with I.C.E. Among them are:

Our fundamental job is to make sure that there are strong workplace protections in every workplace in California. In California, the long standing policy has been that immigration status is irrelevant to protections of California's labor laws.

The Labor Commissioner's Office is a state law enforcement agency that investigates and prosecutes labor law violations. Your presence is interfereing with our ability to enforce state labor laws. It is the Labor Commissioner's general policy not to permit such interference with our state law enforcement duties. Would you please leave our office. The Labor Commissioner does not consent to your entry or search to any part of our office.