Dive Brief:
- The U.S. Justice Department filed a complaint that Dallas-based Potter Concrete Ltd. was infringing on the law when it required citizen and non-citizen job applicants to verify their eligibility to work.
- The company has agreed to pay $115,000, without admitting it did anything wrong, to make the complaint go away.
- Immigration law does not allow employers to treat non-citizens differently in the hiring process but the company's immigration attorney, Richard A. Gump, Jr., says it was human error and rushing to get through the process that wound up with not everyone being asked for the same documentation.
Dive Insight:
Gump says the company did "require or suggest" different documents that some job applicants could use to show they were legally entitled to work, but he chalks it up to trying to get through the process and says no one was turned away because of it. The lesson for contractors is to be even-handed in the candidate-verification process. Which side of the law you land on is based on intent to discriminate, and that is a messy legal battle that, like Potter decided, is good to avoid.