The Denver Sheriff’s Department has been fined by the Department of Justice for not allowing non-citizens to apply. According to the DOJ’s announcement, the Denver Sheriff’s Department was fined for violating provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act, which requires employers to make certain employment available to legal, resident aliens on the same terms as United States citizens, unless they have applied for and received a waiver from the federal government.
According to the Washington Examiner, the department hired about 200 new deputies in 2015 and 2016 and wrongly made citizenship — as opposed to legal permanent residence — a job requirement.
In addition to paying a fine of $10,000, the department will have to go back through old applications and identify those that were rejected because they were from non-citizens, and consider those applicants for future job openings. The department will also receive training from the DOJ and will have to have their hiring policies reviewed by an attorney in the Civil Rights Division.
