2025 HR compliance updates: I-9s, E-Verify, and TPS

HR compliance just got a lot more complicated in 2025. With immigration changes hitting the news daily, I-9 audits on the rise, and penalties for noncompliance hitting sky-high rates, HR teams are facing huge challenges of protecting their organization from risk—not to mention their workforces.

In our recent webinar, our CEO Chapelle Ryon and Kimberly Best-Robideaux, an immigration attorney with over 20 years of I-9 compliance expertise, sat down to discuss what’s happening right now in HR compliance, and what organizations can do right now to keep themselves protected.

Here are three takeaways from that conversation.

1. I-9 in 2025: More audits, higher penalties, and heightened oversight

2025 is already shaping up to be a tumultuous year for I-9 compliance. Since January, unauthorized workers have been thrust into the political spotlight, with a rapid succession of new executive orders designed to crack down on documentation violations, and increase employer liability. 

Penalties have increased, unannounced audits and raids are on the rise, and AI-generated identification fraud and evolving I-9 completion methods have made basic compliance even harder to navigate.

These changes have left HR teams picking their way through a compliance cactus field with an armful of balloons and no room for error—and they’re just hoping one (or more) don’t pop.

But if there’s one overarching theme that unifies all of these changes, it’s that they’ve shifted the lens of I-9 compliance from routine requirement to active enforcement.

“The government wants to make sure that employers are not only completing the form, but ensuring that those who are working at their work site are authorized to work and have the appropriate documentation,” said Kimberly. “So [this activity] is really focused on [getting] your audit files and I-9s in compliance, because [the government] is sending agents out there to investigate.”

This means HR leaders can no longer rely on spot checks or periodic reviews—it’s time to switch your audit processes to always-on.

To keep your team compliant and prepared, make sure you:

• Review I-9 documentation and identify verification processes to catch and resolve errors before formal audits occur.
• Retrain internal stakeholders involved in the I-9 process to ensure standardization across I-9 processes.
• Prepare your business and people, including front desk staff, for how you’ll respond to government audits and ICE visits.
• Create communication templates that cover potential workforce updates and government audit procedures.

2. E-Verify in 2025: More complexity, and less optionality

Up until recently, E-Verify has always been seen as an optional extra to help organizations navigate the challenge of employee verification at scale. 

But as we suspected in our article on 2025 HR compliance predictions earlier in the year, this optionality could soon be tested. An increasing number of states have now implemented stricter E-Verify requirements as part of new hire processes, including Florida, Idaho, and Nebraska. 

One of the biggest developments over the last year has been the launch of E-Verify+—a voluntary pilot program that puts the onus on employees to upload their documents and self-manage parts of their verification process.

“The analogy that I use for E-Verify+ is [that] it’s like TSA PreCheck in theory,” explained Chapelle. “It gives an employee a [pre-cleared] status of an E-Verify case ahead [of time]. But it only matters or gets applied when an employer initiates an I9 that can then be associated with it — the same way a ticket gets applied to your TSA PreCheck status.”

These changes have contributed to an uncertain compliance environment for HR leaders. Ambiguity around the possibility of a national E-Verify rollout is causing many leaders to re-assess if getting ahead of enrollment now is the right move. Meanwhile for HR teams managing multistate workforces, there’s added complexity of managing differing E-Verify requirements across state lines. 

As guidance evolves, HR teams should:

• Confirm your organization’s specific E-Verify requirements based on operating locations, industry, and contract status.
• Monitor state legislation for changing requirements.
• Audit your E-Verify history for compliance patterns and open cases, ensuring documentation remains current.
• Evaluate the benefits of voluntary enrollment, and assess readiness for E-Verify+ participation.

3. TPS in 2025: Sudden policy shifts, and workers at risk

Over the last few months, major overhauls to Temporary Protected Status (TPS) designations have served up some fresh new compliance risks for employers. 

TPS is a classification under federal immigration laws that offers temporary work authorization and protection from deportation for immigrants whose home country is undergoing a humanitarian crisis, war, or natural disaster.

However, recent policy shifts, including rollbacks to TPS for Venezuelan and Haitian workers, have meant that employees that were previously authorized to work under those protections until 2026 are now at risk of losing their jobs and status. That is, unless they can prove that they have an alternative form of work authorization.

"How employers can determine if they have anybody in that situation is if you have an expiration date report that you pull for your I9s, you can look at the specific expiration date to determine if that is more likely than not Venezuela or Haiti TPS,” explained Kimberly. “From there, if you keep copies of the documents, look at the category code for that [employee authorization document] card so that it gives the employer some reference.

“This is something to do not only because you have to re-verify the employment authorization that’s expiring, but also from a business perspective to prepare for the potential loss of some employees that might not [be able to] continue work in the US.”

As the legal environment around TPS continues to shift, HR teams must:

• Run an inventory of your workforce and identify employees with TPS or other temporary statuses.
• Seek guidance from immigration counsel on employee-specific options and timelines according to your workforce audit.
• Factor TPS contingency planning into workforce planning.

Streamlining compliance in an uncertain landscape

With sweeping changes to I-9, E-Verify and TPS on the table within the first quarter of 2025, navigating compliance has become mired in equal parts stress, frustration, and fear for HR teams. 

But we think the changes have only just gotten started—and it’s how HR teams prepare that will determine their success (and level of risk).

Reviewing and reconfiguring the operational foundations of your end-to-end compliance processes, snagging any documentation issues, and understanding your current position will be essential to meeting new changes head-on. The key to success hinges on proactive adaptation, staying informed, and building a flexible strategy that can handle what’s coming next.

Learn more about these changes—and how to navigate them—by watching our full webinar.