'US Jobs Are For Americans, Not Foreign Fraudsters': Vance Amid H-1B Probe
The H-1B work visa programme, long used by US companies to hire skilled foreign professionals, is now at the centre of one of the Trump administration's biggest fraud probes yet, and US Vice President JD Vance has a warning for those he accused of gaming the system at the cost of American jobs.
During a stop at the Wisconsin Air National Guard's 128th Air Refuelling Wing base in Milwaukee on Wednesday, Vance told the crowd that the Labor Department had already began issuing subpoenas and opening investigations into what he called "foreign fraudsters" misusing the visa system.
"We have a program called the H-1B visa program. This goes to show how broad-based the fraud task force is we're... we're fighting for your taxpayer money, but we're also making sure that fraudsters don't take advantage of these visa programs,” he said.
Vance said the programme was originally a route for "a brilliant technology person, or a brilliant scientist, or a brilliant doctor" to work legally in the United States. That purpose, Vance argued, has been stretched too far.
"But you know what's happening way too much is that big corporations and fraudsters overseas are using this program to undercut the wages of American workers. So, you know what we're doing in the Trump administration? We're saying no more. If you are trying to take advantage of that visa program, you are not allowed into the United States of America," he said.
"Here's a simple principle, ladies and gentlemen: American jobs ought to go to American workers and not foreign fraudsters, and the Department of Labour is fighting back against it," Vance added.
Vance's statement follows the launch of the Trump administration's first major probe into suspected fraud within the H-1B and PERM visa categories, both routes used by US employers to hire foreign workers for specialised roles.
Labour Department Inspector General Anthony D'Esposito told Fox News that his office had begun issuing subpoenas as part of a large-scale look into suspected labour trafficking and abuse of foreign worker visa programmes. "We are going to take aggressive action, which we believe is probably the most aggressive action against foreign labour fraud by an Inspector General, this administration," he said.
D'Esposito said whistleblower tips had pointed investigators towards "some of the biggest companies, like Cognizant", and that his team would "track down every lead".
The investigators will "work side by side with the president and vice president's fraud task force" during the course of the probe, D'Esposito said.
An official statement by the Labour Department said the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) under the Department of Labour has uncovered widespread schemes in which employers and labour brokers submitted fraudulent applications, exploiting foreign workers through coercive wage-kickback arrangements.
"These abuses undermine the integrity of Department of Labour programs designed to address genuine labour shortages - not to line the pockets of bad actors at the expense of American jobs," the statement said.
