James Pittman: Welcome to Immigration Uncover, the DocuWise video podcast. This is episode 51. I'm your host, James Pittman. Today, we're gonna be talking about understanding immigration related worksite visits and your best practices for compliance so that you don't ever have to face a worksite visit. And my guest for today is Sarah Sanger, and she is the founder of Sanger Strategies based in Toronto. Sarah, welcome. Thanks for joining us.

Sarah Sanger: Thanks, James. Thanks for having me.

James Pittman: Yep. So, Sarah, I mean, let's get into some of the basics of this because this is an area that, you know, a lot of people and, you know, if you're an attorney and you're listening to this, I mean, most most attorneys are really focused on getting getting the benefits for their clients. But this the the aspect of compliance with the immigration law is an essential aspect of advising, especially corporate clients, business, employment based immigration clients. Every every employer needs to comply with the immigration laws, and that's more true now than it's always been true. But it's Yeah. It's more important to comply now, really, than it than it has been for a very long time. So let's just start out by sort of explaining, you know, how the system works and what are some of the agencies that are involved in this. We have, agencies like ICE, like HSI, which is Homeland Security Investigations. We have DNS, which is fraud detection, national security. All of these are under DHS. What are they, and how do their worksite visits differ?

Sarah Sanger: Sure. So, as you mentioned, these are all agencies within the Department of Homeland Security. Many people will know the Department of Homeland Security was created, in the wake of nine eleven and is responsible for securing, our borders, and that includes overseeing immigration, benefits as well as investigating and prosecuting fraud, or other crimes relating to, the movement of people or goods across the border. So, the main type or the most common type of a site visit in the employment based world, is the FDNS visit. So the fraud and detection national, security. So they are actually part of USCIS, the US Citizenship and Immigration Services. USCIS, is an interesting agency because it is responsible for issuing the benefits, visas, green cards, statuses, relief. And so they have, in a way, a, like, a kind of a customer service mandate. On the other hand, they're obviously responsible for doing that in a legal way and making sure there isn't fraud. So they came up with this system. They are targeting primarily h one b and l one intra company transfer

James Pittman: Mhmm.

Sarah Sanger: Petitions. And so one employer for each beneficiary at least one time is gonna pay this $500 anti fraud fee. And these fees go directly to the FTNS to conduct, investigations into fraud. And part of it is gonna be, just sort of perfunctory. So they'll pull a petition, and it might be intentional. It could be somewhat random. And they will either physically go to the work site location petition, or sometimes they will be nice enough to email or call and just say, hey. Give me this information and get it back to me. I think in today's climate, we're really talking a lot more about site visits and officers are, you know, showing up. It is voluntary, you know, the relationship here, but at the same time, the expectation is that if you're an employer who's sponsoring these foreign workers, you want to participate and comply. And so we wanna have as friendly a relationship with FTNS as possible.

James Pittman: Understood. Okay. And what types of businesses are most commonly targeted for immigration related worksite visits?

Sarah Sanger: So within FDNS, I would say, it is pretty kind of across the board. I've had clients in tech, finance, manufacturing, receive these visits. They're statistically, it's more common for an office worker to receive an FDNS visit than another type of visit. You've got, of course, more adversarial visits, from ICE, which is immigration customs enforcement, and they are the enforcement arm of the DHS. So primarily DHS's benefits, USCIS enforcement, ICE, and then borders, CBP, customs and border protection. So enforcement is exactly what it sounds like. And they, statistically target more, like, manufacturing, industrial warehousing, hospitality, like restaurants and hotels. These are statistically much more likely to receive, the the target of an ICE investigation. ICE does tend to it does it does tend not to be random. It tends to be based at least minimum on, like, a TIF, if not based on, like, a a larger investigation.

James Pittman: How about landscaping and agriculture, things of that nature? Yep.

Sarah Sanger: I would kinda fit landscaping and agriculture. Yeah. I I suppose they are kind of their own, but any anything that is industrial, like roofing, construction, anything where that's basically, has a high number of either unskilled labor or skilled labor, but a lower percentage of professionals, so requiring at least a bachelor's degree or higher.

James Pittman: And do they are they apt to come out just on the, like, on the basis of a first a first tip, or are they really looking to focus their resources on employers that have a pattern and practice of violating immigration law?

Sarah Sanger: So, historically, they focus. They prioritize bad actors. In other administrations, a really big, sort of avenue for getting into this is discrimination or discriminatory or abusive labor practices. I would not necessarily say that's that's the focus currently. I think the focus currently is where can we get more bang for our buck. Where statistically is it more likely

James Pittman: Mhmm.

Sarah Sanger: We're gonna find undocumented workers because that's our job, what we're supposed to do. And and they definitely are probably doing at least some background investigation to validate that they're gonna get some, because there's a lot of attention on this right now. So if they conduct a raid and came up empty and everyone was very compliant, that wouldn't, really be that wouldn't look good. So I think that right now, it's not necessarily a focus on abusive labor practices, but more on statistically where are we gonna find, a higher percentage of undocumented workers and then validating a little bit ahead of time that that they will make some valid arrests.

James Pittman: And what is the trend like been in the last couple years? Has there been an increase in the last couple years? And then what's it been like since, you know, in 2025 since, let's say, January of this year?

Sarah Sanger: Yeah. I mean, since January of this year, it's it's gone up exponentially. The administration has made no secret of of their goal to basically find and deport as many undocumented aliens as possible. So it's really gone up quite a bit. I can't recall the statistics off the top of my head. I'm pretty sure ICE was at a hundred it was either a hundred thousand arrests or a hundred thousand deportations, but the the figures were very similar since January. So within the first not even ninety days, within the first, I think, about sixty days, they hit that hundred thousand mark.

James Pittman: And so what are some of the common reasons why a business might be subject to a worksite visit other than that that, you know, they have undocumented workers and and ICE gets a tip? Are there other any other reasons?

Sarah Sanger: So I think going back to the FDNS, and where a lot of me and my colleagues that are in the in just standard business immigration focus is, looking through petitions. So there are flags that can come up in I one twenty nine petitions. I think type of worksite. I think the the more someone is, disclosing that they're working from home or a third party location, they tend to target those. And this is an important note, I would say, for employers is, FTNS can do a site visit at your site for a contractor. And in fact, that might even be slightly more likely because there is a higher sort of suspicion of fraud or at very minimum, like, not a genuine employer employee relationship in the context where your worker is being placed at a third party site. So, you know, we're seeing officers show up for contractors more often. We're also seeing officers show up at people's homes where their home work address was listed. I work from home. I work from this office. So if I filed a petition, I would need to put, you know, my home address, including my apartment number on that petition. And so an officer could then come to my door and check and say, are you working, and what kind of setup do you have? Do you have a company laptop? So it's something to be mindful. I think those are are flags. And then, of course, industries can have trends as well.

James Pittman: Have you observed any prominent, trends in particular industries?

Sarah Sanger: Well, certainly, there was a time I practiced four years in San Francisco, you know, where there's a lot of start ups and a lot of businesses that don't yet have a history of, income or a history of doing business. Some of them didn't even yet have a functioning website because they were still in development, and everything's very top secret. Right? They're protective of their IP, so they're not putting a lot out there. And so the tech industry, but particularly, newer tech businesses, there was a time when there was, like, a a pretty high ratio, I would say, just anecdotally, you know, of site visits, just making sure that people were really doing what they said they were doing and where we're located where they said they were located. But it was a challenge. You know? I think we're a lot more mindful today, especially post pandemic, around if foreign worker is working from home 20% of the time, one day a week, we will list that so that everybody knows and it's all, you know, clear. But back in the day, I could tell you, you know, we put the office address, and if someone wanted to work from home, as long as it was within normal commuting distance, they would do that, and you didn't need a new petition, which you did it legally. But we did have some incidents back then of site visits to an office where someone's really mainly working from Starbucks or their home or the cafe around the corner or you know, that that was a very common thing back then was to have kind of an open desk policy when, I think that people are becoming a lot more kind of cautious of that. Employers are pulling back from that probably for a myriad of reasons, including tax compliance as well, but I I think immigration is part of it.

James Pittman: Yeah. No. That's that's interesting, and that is that's really something, you know, that's on people's minds these days, that yeah. Well, let's get into talking about sort of, like, how to how companies can prepare, you know, for a worksite visit and hopefully head off a works hopefully never have a worksite visit. But let's talk about, you know, what steps employers should take before they ever get visited to make sure they're prepared.

Sarah Sanger: So there's a lot that that employers can do. The the first and foremost is and this is probably good advice, again, even beyond the immigration context, is make sure all your entrances are staffed. If not secured, staffed. So that in the event of a visit from any government agent for any reason, they are greeted by someone that you have supervision over, control over, that you can train and educate. Educate. One of the the well, the only time, that I one of my clients had a petition revoked was an officer showed up, and there wasn't anyone on-site specifically staffed at the door. So just a random employee met this agent in it was an FDNS visit. So was this was just kind of a standard visit to check on the petition, and it was a random employee that encountered this agent and was just like, I don't know who that is. You know? We're talking about the the alien worker. I've never heard of this person. I don't know. I don't think they work here. You know? And it it it spiraled. It snowballed. It escalated in a pretty big way. And so, anyways, the I think number one is just make sure at any physical worksite, you have staff at those entrances and then follow through with giving them the resources they need, which generally is a protocol document as well as a contact list. And make sure that you have periodic updates. This is the other thing. Update your contact list that because contacts change. HR personnel change, legal personnel change. So make sure that that list is always up to date and make sure your protocols are reviewed. At right now, I would say once every six months. Under other circumstances, I might say once a year just to make sure that they continue to be the contacts and protocols you want them to have.

James Pittman: So let's talk now about, you know, what the HR professionals and the legal team in the company should prepare. How how should they be trained to, you know, handle these visits?

Sarah Sanger: So for FDNS, generally, you want your HR people to quickly be able to confirm for the officer, first and foremost, who this worker is. If are they an employee or are they a contractor? Mhmm. They need to be trained if it's an employee, they need to be trained on the standard questions that get asked, which are typically job title, rate of pay, where they work. If they have a desk or an office there on-site, they wanna walk with the officer to show them. They wanna stay with the officer when the officer is talking to the alien worker. They wanna have easy access to a copy of the petition filed so they can see with their own eyes. Okay. What did we say? What was the title? What was the the pay? What was the worksite address? There can be some changes since that filing without having to file a new petition. Very common. It's just a standard pay increase and maybe even a promotion that's not you know, it's just a half step promotion or something. So someone goes from software engineer to senior software engineer. So they need to be trained to know basically that some changes are okay, but a bigger change in title or pay or location, they would need to loop in counsel rather than get into that conversation with the officer. So you wanna, and then in the event of a contractor, they need to be trained to quickly confirm, oh, this is a contractor, and their employer is company b, and they need to know who from company b they can redirect this officer to, you know, to to take it from there. So there's quite a bit. There's quite a bit of training that we do with our clients, to help them understand kind of the best way to interact with officers and also to know what's coming. Because we the FDNS site visits are more or less go the same all the time.

James Pittman: What are some examples of just overall internal policies that a company should have in place regarding immigration compliance?

Sarah Sanger: So there's your immigration policy. When we talk about that, we're we tend to talk more about what's what your sponsorship policy is. Like, what positions are you willing to sponsor or not sponsor? And a lot of that has to do with costs and risks. I think it's more a matter of understanding that immigration compliance is a group effort. So there's a tendency to be a bit myopic and to take either your global mobility person or your HR person or your legal person, whoever is in charge of your immigration, and task them when making sure the whole business is compliant. Except that immigration compliance comes down to a lot to, like, what every business is doing, what managers are doing, what every each, you know, HRBP is doing, what are your hiring practices more broadly. So stop thinking about it like in immigration and really, you know, issue and understand that compliance is gonna be a lot larger than that. And I'll this is a good time, I think, just to mention the I nine process, which is a is another major target, of government audit and site visits. So you had mentioned ICE and, so HSI, which is Homeland Security Investigations. So HSI sits within ICE, and they will actually execute on an I nine audit. And that that is checking every new hire what their status is. So you could be an employer that has never sponsored an alien worker and won't ever sponsor an alien worker, and you could have an I nine audit. So, like I said, we we have this tendency to think immigration in this kind of box, but it really spreads throughout an entire organization.

James Pittman: I mean, it's, you know, nowadays, it shouldn't be that burdensome to maintain proper I nine records. I mean, it gets you know, years ago, it was kind of like just something you you filled out whenever you started a new job. You just fill that form out. But when you think about companies that have a lot of personnel and have a lot of turnover in their personnel, you know, companies that, like, re a retail industry or something where, you know, they might be hiring a lot of people for short periods of time, you know, during peak seasons and things like that. You know, then you really need to have systematized you know, really systematized way of keeping track of your I nines because those records have to be preserved. They sometimes they have to be updated. Can you talk to me about, like, sort of what's what are some of the best practices for, you know, I nine record keeping and auditing and and other record keeping and auditing of other types of documentation? What would some best practices be? And I'm particularly interested in, you know, any tools that you found for for I nine or, you know, how those records can be digitized and and and and and what's what you think is the best way to do it.

Sarah Sanger: For sure, I think, a lot of employers, large employers, but also small and medium size now, are implementing digital tools such as Workday or Equifax. There's a lot of different tools out there, that can automate, digitize your I nine process. And it is making it easier. These tools make it easier to be compliant because if someone opens a new employee record, therefore, is indicating there is a new hire. If that is created in one of these systems, they have the functionality to then automatically trigger an I nine task or to link it to the I nine process. And that will reduce the odds that someone just fails to do the I nine, and that used to be a problem. Right? If it's all manual and it's every office for themselves and you have 50 people joining on one day, you you could miss someone. But if you've if in order to hire them and put them on payroll, you have to create them in the system, then you will eliminate kind of that risk of just missing the I nine process if it's all linked. And I do think it's a really excellent idea for employers to use, a digital and automated system for all payroll and I nine and other HR functions so that one hire or one employee has all of these records, and compliance sort of checks tax withholding, right, all of it in one place, and even really do a lot these days with rules, automated reminders. I think the biggest issue still is properly accepting the the documents. So they give you a list a, b, and c. And if someone presents a list a document, that's sufficient. If they can't and that's like a a US passport. But if they can't submit one of these primary documents, then they have to do one from list b and one from list c. And those document both your identity and your work authorization. And there's just depending on what someone's status is, what their history is, what documents they have access to, it can be complicated. So you can still have human error in the process because at at the end of the day, it's still a human that has to look at the documents and fill in, this form. But systems can do a lot just to make sure we don't at least we don't miss it. We don't miss doing it. And another one is if someone gives you a temporary work authorization, then employers are required to reverify. The rever so verification process is just a new hire process. It's not an immigration process. It's a I have hired a new employee process. So it's very HR driven. But reverification necessarily is an immigration process because you don't reverify US workers. You only reverify foreign workers. So reverification is where things really break down because an employer will focus on making sure their I nine process is all set up and their HR team knows what they're doing and how to use the software, but none of them are immigration people. So then it comes down so we you know, they'll miss reverification, and we'll look back and be like, oh, you were supposed to reverify this person two years ago. So let's do that now. You know? And so there there's still definitely pitfalls, but for sure, the tools the digital tools are excellent for reducing as much as possible kind of the human element.

James Pittman: Yeah. It it seems it seems like it's always that way. It's when people who, you know, aren't in the immigration field or aren't trained in immigration, whether it's in HR, whether it's at the, you know, DMV to get a driver's license or in any agency when they have to look at immigration documentation and really understand what it reflects and who's in status and who's out of status. That's always that's always a friction point. It's always a friction point. But let's let's say that despite your best efforts, you an employer despite their best efforts, an employer does have a worksite visit. So what should they do from the minute that a government agent arrives?

Sarah Sanger: So first and foremost, determine if it's FDNS or ICE or HSI. Uh-huh. If it's FDNS, you know, like I said, what they should be trained to do is to loop in a local HR or legal or or or manager, whoever you as the employer have taken the time to train. Whoever you've targeted as the people you're gonna help train on how to handle one of these visits, And then your reception area or security at the front should loop that person in to come greet the agent, say hello, answer basic questions, offer them, you know, the confirm the employment real you know, details that they're asking about. If the workers on-site, you can introduce them, stay with them while they're talking with the worker. The worker should answer the same type of basic questions. What is your title? All of that. So I think those protocols, are where we put a lot of our focus because, we that's probably the most common in our client group that, you know, your kinda standard business immigration office focused, roles. But, certainly, if it's ICE or HSI, even if it's just an I even if it's I nine related, like, oh, let let me have copies or spot check your I nine, Definitely want legal looped in, not only your immigration counsel, but your in house counsel or whoever your general counsel is, and you're gonna want them involved. And if it's a more serious search on the property or an a, you know, an arrest potential arrest, then you really need to make sure that there's a warrant, that the warrant is signed by a judge, that the warrant is specific as to who is being targeted or what documents or what areas. So I think it is worth today having at least that baseline understanding or training for your staff even though it's never happened before and we don't expect it to happen. I think there's a lot of worry that if it did happen, no one has any training or background on how to handle it. Like, you know, who do they who to call, what to look for. So I do encourage clients even if it's a even if it's like a paragraph long note at the back of a FDNS training, you know, site visit training manual, put that in to give these basics. Like, this is these are the agencies that would come for other reasons. This is, you know, the spaces or the types of searches that require a warrant. This is what a warrant would need to have, and here is your emergency contact. In the executive level of the company, legal team so that they at least have it. You know? Yeah. For sure.

James Pittman: Now are agents required to have a warrant to conduct these visits, or what are the limits of their authority?

Sarah Sanger: So FDNS doesn't carry warrants because, as I said, it's all based on consent. So, technically, an employer could tell FDNS, sorry. You're not welcome on the site, and we're not gonna answer your questions. I think that would be a terrible strategy and approach. And because then they're gonna go get warrant. They're gonna go make it into some they're gonna refer it to HSI or someone and make it into something bigger. But, but tech then they're not gonna carry warrants. They're just gonna carry they're just gonna sort of it's gonna be sort of civil. Right? Like, hi. You know, I'm I'm from a they're gonna identify themselves clearly, and they're gonna identify typically a particular petition and person beneficiary that they're checking in on. They should have a case number, so your I one twenty nine case number that they're referencing. For an I nine audit also, that is statutorily required of employers. So it's part of the broader I nine regs that basically say we have the right we, the government, have the right to request you turn over your I nine records for inspection. Just like the IRS has the the statutory authority to audit and and request underlying receipts and documents for, any return. So they also they would need a warrant to come physically enter your property themselves and start gathering up documents, but they don't need any kind of special authority to issue you a notice of inspection that says you have three business days to get these records to us. And then lastly, for an actual what we call worksite raid or an arrest or a search of the property, then they would need an actual, like, criminal warrant signed by a judge, just like any other investigation.

James Pittman: Gotcha. Now who who in the company should really be the person who's designated to interact with agents if they should arrive for a visit?

Sarah Sanger: So for FTNS visits, I think HR is probably HR or global mobility depending on your organization and how the mobility function is set up really is probably the best party to interact with the agents. I have had clients as well that make it more manager focused. So if you are the manager of that particular h one b or l one worker, you're responsible for meeting with the agent and giving them that information. But I think the most common is your local HR or local, you know, mobility person. For other visits, it really, like I said, should be in house counsel. Mhmm. And, usually, you want the executive level, the c suites, notified that it's going on. In larger organizations, you're gonna have a head of security as well, and they would need to be notified. So it kinda again, it depends on your size and how you're organized, but there you're you're gonna have different people that you want interacting depending on, let's say, the severity, of the of the legal process that's happening.

James Pittman: And what rights do employers have during these worksite visits?

Sarah Sanger: So, they have the right they have a lot of the same rights as their workers, but they have the right to refuse, you know, to answer questions. They have a right to request a copy of a warrant and to inspect it. They have the right to be physically present when the officer is on-site, doing or speaking to an employee or doing your walk through to ask the officer to provide their information, their name, their agency, if they have some sort of ID number. They can record the the officer. So a lot of it is the same rights. I think it's for employers, it's tough because it really comes down to what makes sense. Because the more you exercise your rights, the more you can be seen to be adversarial or non com you know, not cooperative, and that can strategically not be great for an employer. But for a for an individual, that might make all the strategic sense in the world. So it's it's probably gonna be a little different interests and risk levels in terms of enacting some of those rights, between the employer and the employee.

James Pittman: And then about the employees. So, you know, what should their what's the best practice for, you know, their approach to, you know, being present when the any of these visits are taking place? What rights do they have? And, you know, how should and should employers advise employees on on what their rights are or, you know, how they should conduct themselves during these visits?

Sarah Sanger: For FDNS visits, you know, one thing that most practitioners I have worked with do is whenever a petition is approved, an I one twenty nine petition is approved, is they give not only the approval notice to the worker, but a copy of the file. Mhmm. Sure. And and and a copy of the labor condition application. In fact, the employer is legally obligated to give a copy It's a labor condition application to any h one b worker. So, really, it's about the worker doing their their homework of actually reviewing it. Look at it. Make sure you know as an employee what is what are you sponsored for? What is the job title being sponsored? What is the location? What are the job duties listed? And make sure that, you know, you're familiar and that it matches the reality. Or if there is any kind of gap between what you think your role is and what you're doing on a day to day basis and what you read in the petition, highlight that to your counsel, to your HR. That for FDNS visits, that's really it because they're just gonna come in and ask those same basic questions of an employee as they do an employer. What's your title? What do you do here? What's your schedule? What do you do on a day to day basis? What materials do you use? Do you have any company equipment? You know, these are kinds of who's your supervisor? How often do you meet with them? Them? As long as the information is all aligned, then it's very natural for the employee to be able to just give the answers. They're all very biographic in nature. You know? We know who we are and what we do. So the risk is really just where there are gaps, and so you just want everyone, all parties, including the employee, to be aware of the information and to have that comfort level that they can raise their hand and say, you know, you're saying this is my job, but it's not a hundred I wouldn't describe my job this way.

James Pittman: Now let's talk about some pitfalls, some common pitfalls. What would be some mistakes that companies might make when dealing with these visits?

Sarah Sanger: So I kind of alluded to one already in my story, my my warning story, which is if you do not identify and train and and empower certain staff at your worksites to greet and talk to these officers, you really have no control then, or oversight or idea of what someone else is gonna say. And someone may not know. Like, in my story, I'm sure the person that talked to the officer and said, I don't know. I don't know this person. I don't think they work here. I've never seen them. I don't think that person knew, you know, what what a big deal that was, you know, and what the severity of that. Whereas your HR people, and, your certainly your legal and your immigration people, they all are aware all the time of kind of what this means in the in the broader context. So you wanna funnel the officer to the right audience quickly. And then I also talked about how these visits can happen for your employees, but it can also happen for contractors or third party employees that are just on your site. And so another major risk factor is if a site visit happens for a contractor and your employee, being a manager or an HR person, basically takes ownership of that contractor and says, oh, yeah. Yeah. They work for us. They're great. They they do a great job. So and so is an excellent coder. I assign them you know, I give them their assignments daily. That's also a major risk factor because why aren't you the sponsor then? You know? The employer employee relationship has to be held by the petitioner and the beneficiary. So it's an equal risk if you just act like you've never heard of someone you don't even know they're on your site as it is to take too much ownership over someone who's not your employee. So I think the there's lots of different factors with the in terms of stories and difficulties and challenges or times when I've had to step in to try to have a second meeting, for example, with FDNS and and clarify and explain, it's because one of these sort of miscommunications has happened in the initial contact.

James Pittman: Is there ever a circumstance where, you know, you would advise people to refuse to answer questions, and can they refuse to answer questions?

Sarah Sanger: Yeah. I think for the FDNS visits, it would have to be pretty extreme. But let's say FDNS James, and everyone was aware that a job change had occurred where, an amended petition didn't get filed, and that's a problem. It's a violation. I could see in those circumstances saying, I don't have access to the information you're looking for right now, but give me your list of questions and let me talk to my counsel, and I'll get back to you. Generally, that's not what you wanna do because as I said, it's important to appear open and friendly and and pro compliance. But if it's gonna get really sticky, I would say, okay. Pull back and ask for the officer to either come back another day or give their questions so you can talk to your counsel so that we can then disclose in the way that makes the most sense and also take actions that we need to to fix the inadvertent, you know, violation that has occurred. For the other visits we're talking about, ICE, HSI, where they're it's it's really more criminal in nature. They're they're investigating violations on a broader scale. Employees have a lot of rights, and they they probably do want to leverage these. So, the main ones are they have the right to remain silent. They don't have to answer any questions. They they can decline to sign documents. They don't have to answer questions about their immigration status. They can request to speak to an attorney and wait to speak until they have an attorney they had a chance to consult with an attorney. They are allowed to ask if they're free to leave thereby determining if they're actually under arrest or not. They can request a copy of any warrant. They can, record the site visit or the the interaction with the officers. They can record the officer's name, badge numbers, or, like, physical descriptions. So if if it was something more serious, generally, you know, we we advise clients to please wait, speak with an attorney, consult with an attorney before you offer up any information, but that's in a different context.

James Pittman: Is it common practice to you know, if you're if you're retained as outside counsel, would you be going to the to the client's location to witness the worksite visit yourself?

Sarah Sanger: No. So so, fortunately, my job my job is to keep my clients so compliant that, hopefully, they never have an ICE or HSI investigation open against them. And I will say, knock on wood, thus far in the my thirteen years of practice, I this has not happened to any of my clients. In the event a client got a more adversarial visit from a government agency, I would absolutely be looping in other attorneys, colleagues of mine that do this on a day to day basis. They interact directly with the government. They enter their appearance in court cases. They negotiate with these agencies and defend against accusations. So it wouldn't be me. It would be colleagues, you know, that dedicate their practice to that. I'm sort of the gatekeeper before that. I'm hope hopefully, who you come talk to before any of this has happened to see if I can keep it from ever happening. For FDNS, there is a time. So they don't announce ahead of time typically. FTNS will sometimes email. So I've gotten emails before from them saying, hey. You know, you're you followed this petition. Here's my list of questions. Please give them you know, give me the responses as quickly as you can. I think those days right now, though, may be limited. I think right now, we are talking about physical site visits more often, and they don't announce them. So I wouldn't be there. I would need my clients to let me loop me in, let me know that it had happened. Typically, it's like, hey. We just had a site visit. And then I wanna know what did they ask? What did you say? If there's follow-up, then I can more easily be looped in because that's gonna tend to be via email or another meeting, that's scheduled. But in the moment, attorneys are not notified or invited.

James Pittman: Now how do those types of visits differ from I nine audits? And what are some of the penalties that can occur for I nine audits? I mean, what you know, you think of the I nine as just paperwork, and if it's, you know, if there's an error on the paperwork, you would get a fine. We know that. But what else could happen if your I nine if you're out of I nine compliance?

Sarah Sanger: You know, you can be fined for technical offenses, which is you just didn't properly complete it. But at the end of the day, you did hire someone who is legally authorized to work. But more often than not, ICE does typically deal in kind of a warning system of, hey. You know, we audited 200 I nine records, and your rate of noncompliance was 15%. But they're gonna call out what are substantive violations. So substantive violations are totally different than documentary ones. Substantive is when you have failed to I nine someone at all, when you have accepted the wrong documents and hired someone that didn't did not properly document work authorization. And that is, where the the hefty fines come. So you can be I I'm just looking at it because I wanna get it. These numbers are kinda random. But an employer can be fined up to $5,579 for a first offense of knowingly hiring an unauthorized, you know, alien. And I think this threshold for knowing here is kind of low in the sense that if you looked at the documents and ICE considers them to be obviously not documenting, authorization. I think you'll the accusation is there that you did knowing even if it's knowingly, you know, make the hire, even if it was really just based on a total lack of training. And then up to $27,894 per worker from repeat offenses. So if if you've managed to hire 15 workers, you know, without authorization, you know, I I can't do math that fast, but it's you know, it can be millions of dollars quickly. You know?

James Pittman: Well, that's a lot. That's Yeah. It's it's it's as with so many other things, it's it's so much better. An ounce of prevention is, you know, worth a pound of cure as they say. It's cliche, but definitely something that's and it's easily preventable, really. Now when if during these worksite visits, when the employer is communicating with the government agent, if they're if they're if they have questions about specific employees, how can how can employers ensure that they're not inadvertently violating rights of the employee when they're communicating about them to the government agent? What do you have to watch out for?

Sarah Sanger: I think just, just make sure your staff is trained on what those rights are so that they don't intentionally or inadvertently infringe on those rights. So you wouldn't want, for example, an overzealous security agent who really wants to be compliant with the government to tell an employee, like, you need to answer the question, or you need to come with me, or, you know, you would want them to just be silent on it. You know, you don't you can take the position. Some employers can take the position that they wanna proactively be an advocate and advise their employees what their rights are and and step in on their behalf, but some employers don't wanna do that. And I do think that that's that's gonna be an individual kind of decision for every, risk manager of every business to make is how much do you wanna proactively support versus just be silent on it. But what you definitely don't want is a a staff member to intentionally or inadvertently step on the rights of an employee.

James Pittman: Now once the visit's complete, you know, in terms of your your follow-up, your post visit considerations, so what steps should an employer take to, you know, assess, you know, assess the Pittman, and and what kind of follow-up might there be afterwards? Like, what do you what do you have to think about as an employer after you've been visited?

Sarah Sanger: For FTNS, for sure, you wanna notify your counsel just so that they're aware that the visit happened because No. We it's always helpful information to have, and we do track trends as well across industries and also across individual employers. And it can be if you get if you start getting a lot of FDNS visits, it could be a flag that there is something bubbling on a, you know, on the level of an investigation. So always loop in your immigration council and make sure that they're aware. And I would also provide what your responses were so that we can take a look at what we file on your behalf and what you said and just make sure there isn't any flag there in terms of the that gap I was talking about where it's, like, too much of a change without having filed an amended petition. For I nine audits, again, you're gonna loop in counsel for don't try to do an I nine audit on your on your own. One of the things counsel will do is try to negotiate for more time because, you have to reproduce those records within three business days. I will say we do always encourage clients to self audit and to do these audits before, Because if you get a nine nine a notice of inspection and you have three days and let's just say the government's nice and they're like, okay. You can take a week to get us these documents. You then have a week to try to do an internal audit real quick and figure out where are my gaps, what do I need to self report, you know, to the government, because you wanna be as transparent as possible. It's always better to be the one that knows what your compliance is and to share with the government. We had a incident here, but we're fixing it. Then let the government figure it out on their own. But you may not have time for that practice if you've not been undergoing routine self audits and you have three days and they don't give you more time and that's it. You're just gonna have to turn these records over and hope, you know, hope that they are all in order. And I can tell you from experience, rarely are they a % in order. And, you know, that doesn't mean there are substantive violations in there, but there can be a whole host of, you know, problematic documentary violations.

James Pittman: So let's talk about what the notice of inspection is. Which type of visit is that used in connection with, and are there other analogous sort of, you know, notices or or formal, you know, follow ups that could come out of the other types of visits?

Sarah Sanger: The notice of inspection, I wouldn't say, is too analogous to much else because it's it's really administrative, and it could come via mail. It can also just an officer can come bring it and serve it to you as well. I think probably these days, they could turn them, send them via email too. But that is really give me your documents, which you're required as an employer to maintain. And that that that brings me to another one of my tips, which is just regularly purging records you don't legally have to keep anymore. Because if someone asks for these records and you have them and you don't need to have them, but you have them, you need to turn them over. So, yeah. So I think, I nine records have to be maintained three years from the date of hire or one year from the date of separation, whichever is later. So they're gonna be maintained at minimum for three years. And then beyond three years, we're going by that one year from dev date of separation date. So the notice of inspection is gonna be just give me your documents. That's different than an actual worksite read. So those are when I specifically convene at a location with a warrant, executes a search, and one of the things they're confiscating is records amongst usually other things, like payroll records, Social Security, records, etcetera.

James Pittman: Alright. Now what legal defenses or remedies are available if an employer believes that their rights were violated during one of these visits? What would they do?

Sarah Sanger: I would probably refer them to

James Pittman: Mhmm.

Sarah Sanger: One of, one of my colleagues that actually operates in this area with the government. Because, again, on the FDNS side, it's challenging right now. So, USTIS historically has had something called the office. And

James Pittman: Right. Which was shut down.

Sarah Sanger: Yes. Which has been shut down. So, historically, we would go to the office if something wonky happened Pittman FDNS visit. I'm actually not entirely sure. You know? Right now, I don't feel comfortable giving an answer

James Pittman: Sure.

Sarah Sanger: About what would our remedy be, who would we go to, which which, agency? But it would be the agency itself typically because, again, we're not talking about a court case. We're not talking about something being done through the courts, through the judiciary, or even through, an executive court. We're talking about something administrative in nature. But, historically, my answer would be we would go to the ombudsman's office. If it's another one of these sites visits, like I said, I would loop in one of my colleagues that actually practices in this, you know, criminal defense and immigration defense space. If it's particularly egregious, you can sue, you know, the government if you think you have a claim.

James Pittman: Now if if you get one of these visits, I mean, you know, what would be some steps that an employer would wanna take to proactively sort of, you know, mitigate the risk and reduce the risk of any future visits? So once you've had one of these visits, you know, what would be your your next step to make sure that it doesn't happen again?

Sarah Sanger: Well, I think that's kind of why my general advice with the FDNS visits is to be as transparent as possible while also being aware at all times of who are your workers and what job have you sponsored them for. Because the best thing is to get an FDNS visit and, you know, give all the give the pay stubs, and it shows the salary you said you'd pay them as being paid to them. And show them the workstation, and it's at the work site you said that the person would be at and introduce them to the worker, and it matches the name and date of birth of the beneficiary listed. That's a great outcome. You know, having an FTNS visit is not inherently bad. Having one and being able to prove and show that all the information you provided on your I one twenty nine petition is accurate is a is a good outcome. So it would really again, we're just really talking about if something came out during the site visit that contradicted or didn't correlate to the petition filed. And that has a lot more to do with just general immigration compliance. Like, make sure that you are sponsoring the right people for the right jobs and then maintaining those records.

James Pittman: Now just from your standpoint, you know, how would you assess the mood among your clients since, you know, since inauguration day, since January of this year. I mean, are people much more apprehensive, or do you think it's or or or what are you hearing? And are you getting a lot of calls these days?

Sarah Sanger: Yeah. I definitely, employers are apprehensive. I think at first, everyone knew because it was stated very clearly, we're gonna be executing James on employers that knowingly have a pattern and practice of hiring undocumented workers, and we're coming for that. So a lot of businesses that don't historically have that pattern and practice weren't necessarily super weary as a result of that because it's like, oh, not that's not me. That's not, you know, my wheelhouse. Right? That's not a high risk for my business. But since then, I think there's been enough one off stories of one person being approached, one, arrest being made on-site, or I think a lot of the student arrests even oddly are are making people really apprehensive. It's starting to feel a little bit more like it could happen to anyone, any time, anywhere. So, yeah, I I think I definitely were getting more calls. Yes. For sure. I think there is a larger focus for employers right now to really hunker down and be compliance focused and to assess, take stock. I think a lot of employers are taking stock right now of not only their compliance, but their talent agenda. Like, what makes sense in this climate? And there's the stuff still looming. Right? We we know at some point, some form of a travel ban is coming out, that the government has said that it is, so we're waiting for it. So there's a lot of apprehension, like, well, what will that look like? And we're also getting more calls about, people with the proper documents being stopped and questioned, more aggressively by CBP, being put into secondary inspection. We're getting more calls about, consular visits that are weird. You know, not going you know, having a strange outcome. I try to encourage people not to panic because I also think that part of these stories is stemming from the fact that so many knowledgeable people have left the government. And we saw this during the last Trump administration when you purge career government employees and you have a hiring freeze, you're also just gonna have a way higher incidence of lack of training. That's actually not necessarily intentional. So I think there's a combination of a change in intent and a change in focus and also a a higher incident of just a lack of education and training within these agencies.

James Pittman: Yeah. I mean, that's that's a that's a problem that I've heard echoed, you know, in discussions about what's going on. And a lot of agencies throughout the government is when you you are letting go of a lot of people encouraging them to retire, downsizing the the personnel, etcetera. But you're also getting rid of people who are responsible for training their successors. So you're having a tremendous interruption in, you know, in the the training and the development process of of the employees there. So you're gonna get lower quality output, potentially lower quality output, which, you know, from what we can tell, is materializing in service interruptions and and weird decision making and things not, you know, functioning optimally. So that's totally that's totally, I think, to be expected, and it's it's a really unfortunate consequence. I knew you would be hearing a lot from people. I imagine a lot of companies are really concerned about employees traveling

Sarah Sanger: Yeah.

James Pittman: And making sure that, you know, people's are aware of them. Have you heard of are employees more concerned with hearing about employees' travel plans in advance just to, you know, to know that you know, just in case of any sort of an issue?

Sarah Sanger: Oh, for sure. I mean, I think that that that's best practice all the time. But in this kind of climate, it's not even a best practice that really is a requirement. Like, please, make sure your employees have an easy way, to disclose their travel plans, to record them somewhere so that you know where international travel plans so that you know when they're in The US, when they're not, when they're expected back, or at minimum that your immigration council is can advise in advance what documents to carry, what they can expect. Because, also, it may depend on where you're going, what your activities are, what what port of entry you're expected back through. One of the things that we're always doing in our community is monitoring which airports or ports of entry are more or less problematic from this from what we're talking about both in terms of culture and attitude, but also training and oversight. And so if someone tells me ahead of time, oh, I'm going through part port a, and I have had three clients in the last week tell me, you know, stories of negative experiences coming in through Port A, I have the opportunity to say, hey. You know what? You may consider. You may wanna reroute yourself through port b because port a is having you know? But I can't do that after the fact. So I think it's really important, to let people know ahead of time and then make sure that you're aware as a traveler and they and and also that every employer is aware, kind of what the schedule is.

James Pittman: Yeah. No. Definitely underlining the importance of clients working closely with their attorneys and making sure that their attorneys have all the information needed to really give them the best advice to see that their so that their employees can can stay into can stay in compliance, can avoid the possibility of these types of problems for the employer, and also potentially avoid, you know, very uncomfortable and troubling situations at airports, at borders, etcetera for the employees. Definitely Sanger, super important to work closely with your lawyer. But, Sarah, it's been a a really interesting and important conversation about workplace compliance and these visits. And as you know, I'm sure that we'll have you back again in the future to talk to talk about this again as we see, you know, how things evolve under this administration. They've, you know, they've made a lot of very big promises, and and we'll we will see, you know, how it develops.

Sarah Sanger: Lot of time left.

James Pittman: There's a lot of time left. Right? And we're only two and a half months in. So Yeah. So a lot of things can happen, and a lot has already happened in a short period of time. So Sarah Sanger, founder of Sanger Strategies, employment based immigration lawyer. Thanks so much for joining us on immigration uncovered.

Sarah Sanger: Thank you so much for having me, James, and I look forward to coming back, hopefully, maybe with some better

James Pittman: outcome. News. Yeah. But with some good outcomes.