Outgoing Texas Comptroller Don Huffines is asking President Donald Trump to send federal immigration officials into every government agency in Texas. Huffines said an internal review found decades of failures to comply with federal Form I-9 employment verification requirements. The announcement came after Huffines lost his race to Democrat Sarah Eckhardt.
Huffines said a preliminary internal assessment shows the problems may date back 20 years and could expose Texas taxpayers to about $5 million or more in federal civil penalties. He said the findings suggest government officials knew about the failures and hid them. "This was not ignorance," he said. The comptroller's office has hired outside legal counsel to investigate, and corrective action is underway, according to Huffines.
Huffines urged Trump, the Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to expand the review to every government employee in Texas. "The state of Texas needs to pay its fines for violating federal I-9 requirements, just like every business has to," he said. Huffines will leave office in January, when Eckhardt takes over as comptroller.