California employers are complaining that when they try to do the right thing by helping illegal immigrant laborers become documented, they are punished.
Tom Nogradi, who owns a business that manufactures cables for the aerospace and robotics industries, told the Los Angeles Times when he agreed to sponsor his employees, immigration agents raided his business, and he lost 15 employees.
"We were trying to do what we were supposed to do, and this was the result," Nogradi said. "I thought that was a slap in the face."
Scott Taylor owns a Ventura County landscaping company and is still waiting for a response to paperwork on behalf of one of his employees in 2001.
"I cannot find non-Hispanic, Anglo employees who are willing to do anything," Taylor said. "The work ethic is not anywhere near necessary to sustain a business."
Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, disagrees.
"They (employers) are not doing the right thing," he told the Times. "They are doing the wrong thing."
© Copyright 2006 by United Press International
