A ring accused of helping people from the Middle East obtain student visas by taking their proficiency exams and classes has exposed vulnerability in the nation's security tracking system for foreigners who attend U.S. schools, experts said Tuesday.

The bust unsettled immigration authorities and federal lawmakers who implemented the sophisticated Foreign Student and Exchange Visitor Information System after learning one of the Sept. 11 hijackers had entered the U.S. on a student visa.

A ring accused of helping people from the Middle East obtain student visas by taking their proficiency exams and classes has exposed vulnerability in the nation's security tracking system for foreigners who attend U.S. schools, experts said Tuesday.

The bust unsettled immigration authorities and federal lawmakers who implemented the sophisticated Foreign Student and Exchange Visitor Information System after learning one of the Sept. 11 hijackers had entered the U.S. on a student visa.

Lawmakers voted down a bill Monday that would have required employers to screen workers using a federal background check system amid concerns it would add another burden to business owners.

The Senate State Affairs Committee defeated the measure on 7-2 vote. The bill was aimed at stemming the flow of illegal immigrants into the state, and would have put employers who accepted false identification at risk of losing their business licenses.

A graduate student told University of Nebraska regents Friday that it isn't fair for him to have to pay out-of-state tuition while children of illegal immigrants pay in-state rates.

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - Some businesses would have to confirm the immigration status of employees under a bill passed by the Utah Senate but would no longer face criminal penalties if they didn't.

An original version of the measure included the penalties but bill sponsor Sen. Chris Buttars removed it, saying businesses had complained.

An evaluation of the E-Verify program conducted about two years ago has just been released. (The 338-page pdf is here.) It estimates, among other things, that about half of illegal aliens who were screened between April and June 2008 managed to foil the system and get approved for employment, and opponents of immigration enforcement are tickled pink. Chuck Schumer, who is taking the lead on amnesty, said, "This is a wake-up call to anyone who thinks E-Verify is an effective remedy to stop the hiring of illegal immigrants." Likewise, former Kennedy staffer Marc Rosenblum said, "Clearly it means it's not doing its No. 1 job well enough."

A House panel has approved a bill that would require schools to annually report how many illegal immigrants are enrolled and how much it costs to educate them.

University of Idaho employees will be required to prove their eligibility to work in the United States, citing requirements stemming from federal funding.

Employees will participate in E-Verify sessions, putting forth documentation confirming they are legal to work in the United States. Once in the system, Social Security, the Department of Homeland Security and the federal government verify the information. "Because we receive a lot of federal contracts, it got to the point where if we weren't going to comply we may very well risk losing all the contracts," said Lucy Aragon, human resources assistant.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's latest proposals to close California's budget shortfall would end public assistance for most new legal immigrants, eliminating emergency cash, food and medical aid for those who don't yet qualify for federal welfare.

The proposal would represent an about-face for the state. In 1996, Congress denied access to welfare for most legal immigrants who weren't citizens. California and other states established programs to fill the gap.

Federal immigration authorities had alerted Gebbers Farms that a number of its employees' hiring forms were suspect. Unless those employees could prove they were in this country legally, the company would let them go.

Many couldn't. Like the vast majority of America's agricultural work force, they were illegal immigrants who used fake documents to get jobs picking and packing fruit, in this case in and around this small town on the Columbia River north of Wenatchee.

Five days later, the company dismissed an estimated 550 workers — equal to about a quarter of Brewster's population. It was the biggest firing of its kind ever seen in Washington. And former workers say the letters and firings are still coming.