11:47 AM PDT, July 16, 2005
BOISE, Idaho — Faced with the costs of coping with illegal immigrants, one county is looking to the courts for help -- by filing a racketeering lawsuit against the businesses that hire these workers.
The legal theory: that a pattern of immigration violations by employers is costing Canyon County millions for law enforcement, education and social services.
"Their presence lowers the labor wage for American citizens and removes employment opportunities," county Commissioner Robert Vasquez, an ambitious politician who just started a bid for Congress, said of the illegal workers. "Certainly it uses tax dollars to provide them with educational services, medical care, unemployment compensation for those that are injured on the job. They are a drain on the taxpayers of Canyon County, the state of Idaho and the U.S. in general."
The county's attempt to recoup its expenses would be filed under the federal Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, commonly called the RICO Act, which has been used against targets ranging from organized crime to Internet spammers.
It would be the first time that a government has sued a business under RICO, enacted in 1970, legal experts say.
The county signed a contract Tuesday with a RICO specialist, Chicago attorney Howard Foster, and Vasquez said the lawsuit was expected to be filed soon.
"There is no such lawsuit ever in American history," Foster said. "I don't know if around the country other county commissioners or governments are really as interested as they should be to protect the rights of their citizens."
Idaho may seem a strange stage for an immigration test case. The state has just 19,000 illegal aliens, and ranks 35th among the states, just above Rhode Island, according to estimates from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Canyon County is just southwest of Boise, against the Oregon line.
But Vasquez has developed a reputation as a staunch opponent of illegal immigration. He has tried to bill the Mexican government for the cost of dealing with illegal immigrants from that country, and he tried unsuccessfully to have Canyon County declared a disaster area for what he claims is an impending "invasion" of illegal immigrants.
Carl Rusnok, a Dallas-based regional spokesman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said he didn't have any specific comments on Canyon County's case.
Vasquez won't say which businesses will be sued until the actual lawsuit is filed. He estimates the county has spent at least $2 million on costs related to illegal aliens.
Employers say the lawsuit could spell the end of many labor-intensive businesses that rely on immigrant labor, or at least drive up the cost, said Ann Bates, executive director of the Idaho Nursery and Landscape Association.
"We do our best to be sure that they are legal, but the laws restrict you as to what you can ask," Bates said. "We hope that someday somebody really understands that if we lose our labor force, they lose."
If Canyon County succeeds, the case could create a legal structure for other governments concerned about undocumented workers.
"Right now people say there's no money in enforcing the law, but now there might be for attorneys and trial lawyers. It could create a vested interest in enforcement," said Steven Camarota, director of research at the Center for Immigration Studies in Washington, D.C, which supports immigration restrictions.
The RICO Act does offer a tempting prize, since winners can be awarded triple damages.
On the surface, Canyon County seems to have a solid case, said G. Robert Blakey, one of the authors of the RICO Act and a law professor at the University of Notre Dame.
"If people are knowingly bringing in and exploiting undocumented immigrants, they are creating a federal crime," Blakey said. "What this suit raises is just whether the government units -- federal, state and local -- can sue for the damages they suffer."
However, Blakey notes that some federal courts have already ruled that governments can't try to recover the cost of being a government.
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On the Net:
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services: http://uscis.gov/
Center for Immigration Studies: http://www.cis.org/
Idaho Nursery and Landscape Association: http://www.inlagrow.org/