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House passes first-substitute Senate Bill 81 after wide debate over E-Verify, transport penalties and enforcement
Summary
First-substitute Senate Bill 81, a comprehensive illegal-immigration package requiring E-Verify for certain public hires and contractors, imposing verification for benefit eligibility, and tightening transport and harboring penalties, passed the Utah House 56–15 after multiple amendments and contested floor debate over enforcement mechanics, civil-rights language and fiscal impacts.
The Utah House on March 3 approved first-substitute Senate Bill 81 after hours of floor debate and multiple amendments, sending the measure back to the Senate as amended.
Representative Noel, the House sponsor, opened the debate by outlining the bill’s key provisions: requiring sheriffs to ascertain citizenship for persons arrested on felonies or DUIs, imposing a rebuttable presumption of flight risk for detained undocumented aliens, prohibiting certain licenses for individuals lacking lawful presence, requiring public employers and government contractors receiving taxpayer funds to use the E-Verify system for new hires, and conditioning public-assistance eligibility on verification of lawful presence. The measure also creates a fraudulent-documents identification unit, contingent on funding, and criminalizes knowingly transporting, concealing or harboring an undocumented person for commercial advantage as a Class A misdemeanor, the…
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