Golden State Fence rapped for hiring illegal immigrants
Undocumented workers helped build border fence; company to pay $5 million in fines for violating earlier agreement; two executives face prison time
Every few months or so comes a story about a rabidly anti-illegal immigration congressman who is discovered to have used illegal immigrants himself, typically as nannies or day laborers. Until today, however, we had never heard of a case where a border fence company did the same. It seems Riverside, California-based Golden State Fence has agreed to pay nearly $5 million in fines after the company was discovered in 2004 and 2005 to be violating a 1999 agreement to cease the practice. Two executives face six months in jail (an opportunity, perhaps, to experience fencing from a different perspective.)
The company’s work includes the border fence between San Diego and Mexico, so the oversight here suggests that management was more focused on dollars and cents than on the political winds. Yet the company has learned its lesson — an ironic lesson: “Golden State Fence’s attorney, Richard Hirsch, admits his client broke the law,” NPR reported. “But he says the case proves that construction companies need a guest-worker program.”
-read more in Scott Horsley’s NPR report
