Avoiding Discrimination When Completing Form I-9 • Verifyi9 Audits

To avoid discrimination in the hiring process and Form I-9, employers should:

Treat employees equally when recruiting, hiring, and terminating employees, and when verifying employment eligibility through the Form I-9 and E-Verify processes.
Allow all employees, regardless of national origin or immigration status, to choose which document or combination of documents they want to present from the Lists of Acceptable Documents of the Form I-9. For example, an employer may not require a non-U.S. citizen to present an Employment Authorization Document issued by DHS if he or she chooses to present a driver’s license and unrestricted Social Security card.

Employers should NOT:

Set different employment eligibility verification standards or require that different documents be presented by employees because of their national origin or citizenship status. For example, employers cannot demand that non-U.S. citizens present DHS-issued documents like “green cards”.
Ask to see a document with an employee’s Alien or Admission Number when completing Section 1 of the Form I-9.
Request to see employment eligibility verification documents before hire or completion of the I-9 Form because someone looks or sounds “foreign,” or because someone states that he or she is not a U.S. citizen.
Refuse to accept a valid employment eligibility document, or refuse to hire an individual, because the document has a future expiration date.
Reverify the employment eligibility of a lawful permanent resident (“LPR”) whose “green card” (i.e., Form I-551, Permanent Resident Card) has expired after the LPR is hired.
Require that, during reverification, an employee present a new unexpired Employment Authorization Document. For reverification, employees are free to choose any document either from List A or from List C of the I-9 Form, including an unrestricted Social Security card.
Limit jobs to U.S. citizens unless U.S. citizenship is required for the specific position by law, regulation, executive order, or federal, state or local government contract.