In another stunning defeat for American workers, Washington, D.C., U.S.
District Court Judge Tanya S. Chutkan ruled against Save Jobs USA, and
declared that its effort to block the Department of Homeland Security from
giving work permits to H-4 visa holders is without merit. The H-4 visa is
given to H-1B visa workers’ spouses, mostly South Asian women. The suit
further claimed that DHS’s unilateral action ignored the Immigration and
Naturalization Act’s American worker protections, and stated the Obama White
House sought to reverse the longstanding congressional policy.
In her ruling, Jamaica-born Judge Chutkan, a President Obama appointee,
ruled that allowing H-4s to work, a benefit their visa did not previously
permit, didn’t unfairly affect the American workforce. Obama, through an
executive action last year, granted work authorization to spouses that had
applied for permanent residency green cards.
Save Jobs USA was founded by a group of former information technology
workers who had worked for Southern California Edison, but were fired in
February 2015 and replaced by H-1B visa holders. The group said that SCE,
which laid off a total of about 500 Americans, was importing cheaper
overseas labor.
On its face, Judge Chutkan’s decision is ridiculous. Her position that
adding approximately 180,000 H-4 visa holders to the labor force would not
impact American workers defies logic. Unlike their H-1B spouses who
purportedly have special skills and must work in information technology, the
H-4s can seek employment in any field, and pose a direct challenge to
American workers in any field. With more than 92 million Americans detached
from the labor force, and the Economic Policy Institute’s 2014 research
showing that for three of every five applicants, no job openings exist,
180,000 new workers competing, by definition, further saturates an already
glutted job market.
The broader question in the H-4 visa case is whether President Obama through
DHS has the authority to unilaterally grant work permission, in this case to
immigrants who came to the U.S. with the understanding that they would not
be allowed employment. When, in 2014, an immigration lawyer was asked what
type of employment an H-4 visa holder could seek, she replied flatly:
“Absolutely none,” and excluded working from home, reselling on eBay,
swapping domestic services for gifts, and volunteering for free if the
position is normally compensated. Unless Save Jobs USA wins its appeal, H-4s
will now be able to work anywhere.
Judge Chutkan added a cruel note to her decision when she wrote that upon
granting H-4s employment privileges, DHS intended to “alleviate the
financial and emotional burden placed on H-1B visa holders and their
families during the lengthy period in which only one spouse may be
employed.”
Apparently, Judge Chutkan is dismissive of the “financial and emotional
burden” suffered by American workers and their families fired by, among
other corporations, Disney, Caterpillar, Toys “R” Us, Yahoo, Google, HP and
Microsoft, to list but a few. An estimated 650,000 H-1B visa workers are
currently in the U.S. labor force.
Predictably, Judge Chutkan confirmed what’s been the one constant in the
Obama administration: when it comes to jobs, immigrants get preference over
Americans.
A Californians for Population Stabilization Senior Writing Fellow, Joe can
be reached at
on Twitter @[email protected].
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