The misuse and abuse of H-1B visas was exposed in a hearing held on Feb. 25 before a Senate subcommittee chaired by Senator Jeff Sessions. The subcommittee heard from one of the 250 skilled technical employees of the Walt Disney Company in Florida who were laid off after being forced to train foreign replacements recruited under the H-1B program.
Sen. Sessions pointed out in his opening statement that “technology companies will cut out at least 330,000 jobs this year. There is no shortage of highly qualified working American professionals, nor is there a shortage of American engineering college graduates each year.”
Only about half of our science, technology, engineering and math graduates find STEM jobs in those fields.
Ted Cruz recently called for suspending all H-1B visas for 180 days, and he co-sponsored a bill with Sen. Sessions that would impose stiff new requirements on companies that use them. Cruz’s bill, called the “American Jobs First Act,” would open job opportunities for American college graduates by eliminating visas for foreigners who don’t have a Ph.D. or at least 10 years of “relevant experience.”
Marco Rubio, on the other hand, remains a co-sponsor of the I-Squared bill (S. 153), which would relax requirements and triple the number of H-1B visas to 195,000 a year. Cruz’s bill would eliminate the current per-country cap, which means that workers from India would get many more of the visas than they already do.
The wages of working Americans have been stagnant for many years, and part of the reason is our high level of immigration (both legal and illegal) and the many different guest worker programs. Tell your member of Congress to tighten up or eliminate those programs, and support presidential candidates who put American workers first.
Phyllis Schlafly has been a national leader of the conservative movement since the publication of her best-selling 1964 book, A Choice Not An Echo. She has been a leader of the pro-family movement since 1972, when she started her national volunteer organization called Eagle Forum. In a ten-year battle, Mrs. Schlafly led the pro-family movement to victory over the principal legislative goal of the radical feminists, called the Equal Rights Amendment. An articulate and successful opponent of the radical feminist movement, she appears in debate on college campuses more frequently than any other conservative.
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