President Obama’s announcement of his controversial plan to provide amnesty for illegal immigrants to remain in the country who meet certain requirements raises a few employment and immigration issues for employers. Putting the politics aside, it is a good time for employers to review their obligations under the law to confirm a worker’s eligibility to work, especially given the new laws taking effect in California in 2015. Below are five areas involving federal and state immigration laws and verification requirements California employers need to be aware of going into 2015.

1. The President’s proposal does not change employers’ current obligation to verify employees’ eligibility to work in the United States.

The President’s proposal will take time to implement, and given the change of power in the Senate in the last election, there is a lot of uncertainty about the effect of the President’s proposal. Even with the political uncertainty, the President’s proposal recognizes the need to create a “provisional legal status” for illegal immigrants that may be provided citizenship. The White House’s website states the following:

Undocumented immigrants must come forward and register, submit biometric data, pass criminal background and national security checks, and pay fees and penalties before they will be eligible for a provisional legal status. Agricultural workers and those who entered the United States as children would be eligible for the same program. Individuals must wait until the existing legal immigration backlogs are cleared before getting in line to apply for lawful permanent residency (i.e. a “green card”), and ultimately United States citizenship. Consistent with current law, people with provisional legal status will not be eligible for welfare or other federal benefits, including subsidies or tax credits under the new health care law.

The details of this system still need to be set out and a process put into place. So employers need to continue to follow the current requirements to verify employment eligibility, and it is not likely that any of the requirements under Federal law will change anytime soon.

2. Expect increased enforcement by federal agencies of immigration and labor laws.

President Obama’s proposal also calls for increasing the monitoring and audit of employers to ensure they are complying with the immigration laws. The President’s proposal seeks a new “labor law enforcement fund” to “ensure that industries that employ significant numbers of immigrant workers comply with labor laws.” The White House’s website touts the fact that ICE has increased his audits of employers since January 2009, and has fined more companies than the Bush administration.

Employers need to review their policies to ensure that they comply with federal and California labor laws. In my practice, I have seen an uptick in DOL audits of employers over the last two years. It is important for California employers to understand the different employment law requirements between federal law and California law, and to ensure that they are complying with the law that applies to their particular workforce.

3. In California, employers need to recognize the new California drivers’ licenses being issued on January 1, 2015 to undocumented workers.

Illegal immigrants will be able to obtain a California driver’s license beginning January 1, 2015. AB 60 was passed in 2013 allowing people who cannot prove their eligibility to be in the United States legally the ability to obtain a driver’s license. The California DMV will begin issuing these drivers’ licenses in the beginning of next year. The licenses will be marked with the phrase “federal limits apply” on the front of the license in the same size and color of text as the other text. This statement will be located in the top right corner above the Class designation on the licenses. On the back of the license, it will have the statement that the license is “not valid for official federal purposes.”

The California drivers’ licenses issued under AB 60 are not valid documentation to prove eligibility to work in the United States. It is important for employers to train their personnel who are responsible for verifying documents when completing the Form I-9 to ensure that the documents presented by the worker are valid for I-9 purposes. In addition, it would be a good time for employers to audit their Form I-9 process and document retention policies.

4. It is illegal for employers to discriminate against workers who present licenses obtained through AB60.

A new law passed in 2014, AB 1660, makes it a violation of California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act (“FEHA”) to discriminate against a worker who presents a driver’s license which was issued to them under AB60 and the individual does not have the legal right to work in the United States. Read this last sentence again and it is not hard to see the rock (federal I-9 obligations) and the hard place (California law) that employers find themselves between. AB 1660 amends FEHA to specify that discrimination on the basis of national origin includes, but is not limited to, discrimination on the basis of possessing a driver’s license issued under this new law. California employers need to be clear on what their obligations are under federal law and carefully navigate these obligations to ensure they do not run afoul of AB 1660 and Vehicle Code section 12801.9.

5. California employers need to treat driver’s license information as confidential employee information.

AB 1660, which amends Vehicle Code section 12801.9, provides that employees’ drivers’ license information obtained by the employer is confidential:

Driver’s license information obtained by an employer shall be treated as private and confidential, is exempt from disclosure under the California Public Records Act (Chapter 3.5 (commencing with Section 6250) of Division 7 of Title 1 of the Government Code), and shall not be disclosed to any unauthorized person or used for any purpose other than to establish identity and authorization to drive.

Therefore, employers need to review their record keeping procedures to ensure that any driver’s license information for their employees is keep in a secure manner and limit other employees’ access to the data.