President Trump does not often clash with his base supporters’ most essential beliefs, one of which is that most immigration to this country is destructive.
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However, even as many in Trump’s base push for elimination or at least reductions in the number of H-1B immigration visas used mostly by high-tech workers, their leader has leaned the other way, even recalling that in his businesses he has “used (H-1Bs) many times. It’s a great program.”
That puts him at odds not only with many of those who voted him back into office but also with Vermont’s far-left independent U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, who describes H-1Bs as a program “to replace good-paying American jobs with indentured servants from abroad.” Of course, H-1B workers are not indentured but can switch jobs if a new employer gets a transfer approved.
Nevertheless, it’s high time for a more intense look at this program that lets American companies hire as many as 85,000 highly educated foreign workers per year (20,000 slots are reserved for foreign workers with U.S. master’s or Ph.D degrees).
There’s also the possibility that Trump’s positive view of the 35-year-old program has been influenced by his well-publicized “bromance” with Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, whose companies including Tesla and Space X last year employed just short of 1,800 H-1B workers. Musk, a native of South Africa, spent more than $250 million helping Trump get elected in 2024.
H-1B workers’ average six-figure pay puts them among the top 10% of U.S. wage earners, but critics maintain their immigration status compels docility in the workplace and that they are often hired at the expense of similarly qualified American workers.
This longtime contention was backed by a striking statement inserted into the Federal Register in 2006 by the U.S. Labor Department during George W. Bush’S presidency. “The (H-1B) statute does not require employers to demonstrate that there are no available U.S. workers or to test the labor market for U.S. workers.” The statement was never retracted, revised or revoked.
In 2023 (the last full year for which figures are available) the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency approved about 24% of applications from companies wanting to hire H-1B workers.
Even with unemployment in the science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) categories at only about 2.5 percent last year, there’s no way with certainty to contradict claims that equally qualified American workers are routinely denied jobs in favor of foreign workers who are guaranteed to cause no trouble and work for somewhat less money.
Of one thing there can be no doubt: H-1B workers, who can usually stay here legally no longer than six years unless they become citizens during that time, often overstay their limits by several years. After their permits expire, many work in industries that routinely employ large numbers of the undocumented, including hotels and ridesharing.
A significant share of all this occurs in the Bay Area, whose high-tech companies employ about one-third of all H-1B visa holders. At the same time, those and similar firms over the last two years laid off thousands of American workers while holding on to almost all their H-1B employees, a reality that supports the claims of those who contend immigrants take jobs away from Americans.
Of course, 35% of U.S. graduate school students in STEM areas are now foreign-born, most wanting to stay here after getting their advanced degrees. The H-1B program is a convenient way to accomplish this legally.
Said Musk on his X (formerly Twitter) social media platform, “Of course, my companies and I would prefer to hire Americans, and we do … however, there is a dire shortage of extremely talented and motivated engineers in America.”
Whether that’s correct or merely an excuse for hiring somewhat lower-paid workers at the expense of qualified Americans remains open to dispute, as it has been for almost 20 years. The current debate over H-1Bs will prove healthy if it provides a reliable solution to that argument and leads to reality-based improvements in the program.
Email Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com, and read more of his columns online at californiafocus.net.
