Posted on 02/09/2016 7:51:07 AM PST by xzins
It's going to be hard for the Republicans to field a presidential candidate as enthusiastic about the H-1B visa as U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas).
Cruz, who announced his presidential bid this morning, once proposed an immediate increase in the base H-1B cap from 65,000 to 325,000. Cruz offered the H-1B increase as an amendment in 2013 to the Senate's comprehensive immigration bill.
Cruz's amendment was defeated by the Senate's Judiciary Committee, which approved an 180,000 H-1B cap increase in the comprehensive immigration bill. The House never acted on this legislation.
Cruz's H-1B amendment, however, proposed increasing H-1B fees from $1,500 to $2,500 for those with 25 employees or more. The money would be used to create block grants to promote STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) education.
During the Senate committee debate, Cruz said imposing restrictions on the visa was unnecessary, but said he would support restrictions if the Judiciary Committee – then debating the bill – would agree to his cap recommendation. Among the restrictions in the Senate bill was a provision aimed at large offshore outsourcing providers that limited their use of H-1B or L-1 visa workers to 50% of their workforce.
Cruz is part of large group of politicians who will not acknowledge the H-1B's visas use in offshore outsourcing or the reality of U.S. workers who are forced to train their visa-holding replacements. In defending this H-1B increase, Cruz cited a study by the American Enterprise Institute, which argued that visa workers create jobs. This organization primarily represents the views of large companies and asset management firms.
(Excerpt) Read more at computerworld.com ...
Cruz is bought and paid for by the Cheap Labor Express. No window dressing is going to change that.
This article is about a year old. I believe he has walked this proposal back. It was one of the most offensive policies I found that he held as well.
Trumpbots don’t care about the truth. Trumpbots gotta hate hate hate hate hate. Shake it off.
I don’t think you are convincing anyone. It was another poison pill. Besides, what was Trump saying in 2013? How can you totally ignore all of Trump’s past?
Any new info about the BC?
Jeff Sessions: "Ted Cruz was on my side and fought this legislation"
I am a stem worker. I think Cruz has changed his position on this.
Also TPP was a bad vote. We need free trade , but only with similar countries like Canada and Singapore.
And only in a multi lateral, not bi lateral way.
So while Trump is good on these issues, I still lean Cruz as he has constitutional principles.
My husband has been out sourced for the last thirty years in his line of work, Sweden, Denmark and Japan
His company looked for 12 months to find the right candidate for the job in the US, had to go to Europe to find someone, who came on a h1b visa.
When there are Americans not trained in the sciences what are companies to do?
Before you ask, we live in California.
If this is true, Cruz should quit the race and resign the Senate.
A personal story.
A friend of mine was the head of a department of 40 programmers. All the jobs were outsourced offshore.
He has a BS in CS and 2 masters, CS, and Business.
He has been in and out of temp consulting jobs for 4 years.
Over the summer he had 6 weeks training Foreign H1b visa programmers who didn’t have the specific knowledge to do their jobs. This was the pre on the job training.
They lived in dorms of 6 to a big suite, and were bused daily to the instruction site.
People tell me bosses won’t train American workers but they train inexperienced H1b people who are learning but have no experience.
Normally I wanted 2 years on the job experience in what we wanted you to do. Makes me sick how this don’t matter when Scabs are involved.
I am a stem worker. I think Cruz has changed his position on this.
Also TPP was a bad vote. We need free trade , but only with similar countries like Canada and Singapore.
And only in a bi lateral, not multi lateral way.
So while Trump is good on these issues, I still lean Cruz as he has constitutional principles.
From Ted Cruz’s immigration plan:
Suspend the issuance of all H-1B visas for 180 days to complete a comprehensive investigation and audit of pervasive allegations of abuse of the program: Initiate an immediate 180-day investigation and audit of the H-1B visa program and enact fundamental reforms of this program to ensure that it protects American workers. In recent months, more and more reports have become public of companies replacing American workers with cheaper foreign workers, contrary to the stated intent of the H-1B visa program. This will stop, and the H1-B program will be suspended until we can be certain that the program is no longer being abused.
Enforce existing federal protections for American workers: Conduct systematic audits of the companies that have taken advantage of the H-1B visa program during the last 15 years. All companies that have violated the terms of the H-1B visa program will be barred from using it for a period of years. The Attorney General will have authority to prosecute any individual found to have committed H-1B visa fraud, and offending companies will be suspended from receiving government grants and contracts.
Amend the H-1B visa program to fulfill its original purpose: Work with Congress to pass reform legislation for the H-1B visa program that will:
Create an advanced degree requirement: Only individuals with advanced degrees in their respective fields may be brought to the United States with an H-1B visa. And preference will be given to those with advanced degrees from American universities.
Create a “layoff cool-off†period for all H-1B visa applications: Companies must wait one or two years between laying off a worker and bringing in any H-1B foreign workers to ensure that the program is not used to displace American workers.
Establish accreditation or recognition requirements for overseas schools: The recent lack of federal oversight of the H-1B visa program has fueled a cottage industry of diploma mills. Foreign academic institutions must meet minimum accreditation standards at least as stringent as those imposed on American universities in order to qualify for the advanced-degree requirement.
Require sworn affidavits describing domestic hiring efforts: Companies will provide sworn statements and documentation that detail their efforts to hire Americans before requesting foreign workers through the H-1B visa program. Individuals who make false statements in these affidavits will be subject to perjury charges.
Suspend companies from H-1B visa eligibility for failure to help foreign workers obtain green cards: Many companies misuse the H-1B visa program to train foreign workers that they intend to send back overseas to compete with America. The law must impose additional requirements on employers to pursue Legal Permanent Resident status on behalf of their H-1B visa-based foreign workers, or risk loss of access to the program.
“Cruz, who announced his presidential bid this morning,”
Dang near a year ago.
We know he has since called for a halt to H1B visas since, after the debacle it has become.
B-B-b-bbut i-i-i-it was j-just a poison pill. Yeah, that’s the ticket!
This is not an issue where you get to say I changed my mind. This is a moral constitution issue, you know it is wrong and fight to stop it or you are not worthy.
One more and we have a cat.
This is nothing compared with saying a dirty word!
That argument would have some legs IF he hadn’t doubled down on it AT THE BEGINNING OF HIS CAMPAIGN!
What a joke. That is his position? Suspend H1B visas for 180 days? Is that a typo? Did he mean 180 weeks?
You make an excellent point, and it really relates to southern NH. That area is the home to a lot of tech workers and they've suffered because of H1B visa workers and other shenanigans to cost them jobs that pay well. Might be a factor if Cruz doesn't do well.
In order to protect our national security and serve American workers, he will suspend and audit H-1B visas and halt any increase in legal immigration so long as American unemployment remains unacceptably high.
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