In July
of this year, the U.S. House overwhelmingly passed H.R. 1044, the Fairness for
High-Skilled Immigrants Act. The bill had broad bipartisan support,
with Democrats voting 224-8 in favor of it and Republicans voting for the act
by a measure of 140-57. The legislation represents one of the most horrific acts
of aggression against the American worker in decades. It reveals
that American immigration policy is really just a competition among various
groups struggling for supremacy, with Congress ceding control of immigration to
the most powerful foreign actors: India and China.
Currently, a cap is in place
that limits the number of H-1B tech visas so that no more than 7% of the total
number of those visas come from any one country. H.R. 1044
eliminates this cap. The
primary benefactors of this removal are the Indian tech workers who have been
brought over to this nation and face a backlog due to this cap as well as the
workers in India who seek to come to the U.S. It is estimated that
once this legislation goes into effect, India will receive more than 90% of
these visas for the next decade. The legislation also increases the
per-country cap on family-based immigrant visas from 7% to 15%.
As if this were not enough, the legislation also alters the number
of EB-5 investment visas that a nation can purchase — opening the door to mass
migration from China.
In 2017, the U.S. issued roughly
180,000 H-1B Visas. Assuming that each of those visa-holders
brought over a wife and two children and 90% of those Visas came from India,
this would mean an addition of roughly 6.5 million new Indian residents over
the next decade. This
would more than triple the Indian population in the U.S. even before chain
migration kicked in.
The average pay for tech workers in the US is $39,000 a
year. The effect this
legislation would have on this already low salary as well as to the established
culture of the nation will be catastrophic, to say the least.
The list of congressional representatives who support and oppose
this legislation shows that politics does indeed make strange
bedfellows. Included among the narrow swath of opponents are the
normal cadre who oppose mass migration as well as those who oppose the bill for
personal reasons, such as Congresswoman Ilhan Omar from Minnesota and
Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib from Michigan. Omar is an immigrant from
Somalia, and Tlaib is the daughter of Palestinian immigrants.
So why does an immigrant and the daughter of immigrants oppose
legislation that would open a massive door to large numbers of
immigrants? The answer to this question is as simple as it is
painful. These representatives want immigration to come from their
native lands, and H.R. 1044 reduces or eliminates immigrants from those nations
in favor of India and China. In effect, America is up for grabs, and
Congresswoman Omar and Congresswoman Tlaib see this legislation as detrimental
to their people's ability to gain a larger foothold in America.
Ten of the 23 Republican representatives from Texas cosponsored
the bill (the state with the highest Republican support). A total of
16 of those 23 voted for the legislation. Texas already has an
immigration problem, and this legislation would exacerbate this problem for the
Republican party.
Ernst and Young and Deloitte LLP are two of the largest recipients of H-1B
Visas. These two companies have donated an average around $10,000 to
16 or 17 Texas Republican congressional representatives in each of the last few
election cycles. The interesting part about this is that many of the
representatives who received this money voted against the legislation, and some
that received none of it voted in favor of the bill.
Newly elected congressman Dan Crenshaw (District 2) cosponsored
the legislation. He and Congressman Weber (District 14) are two
notable exceptions to the list that received money from Deloitte and
E&Y. Congressman Crenshaw'sthird highest donor is a firm that specializes in real
estate known as Ilan Investments. The company donated more than
$11,000 to Congressman Crenshaw's campaign and is owned by an Indian-American
named Chowdary Yalamanchili. Congressman Randy Weber (District 14)
voted for the legislation and received more than $13,000 over two election
cycles from the Azhar Chaudhary Law Firm — which specializes in H-1B visas.
In addition to this, there was
a great deal of lobbying around this bill. The examples of
Crenshaw and Weber show that if you sorted through the maze of money around
direct donations, PAC money, and lobbyists, you would eventually find something
that could be seen as revealing a quid pro quo for every
congressman who voted for the legislation.
What was needed in
this case was for each congressman to explain why he feels the need to
drastically alter immigration policy in this manner. There was very
little debate on this legislation, and this is the single most revealing aspect
of it. For reasons that no one can really nail down, Congress feels
the need to alter immigration to heavily favor two nations in support of an
employment field that is already overcrowded and should be a staple of the
American middle class. The fact that they seemed to feel no need to
consult with the American people or explain this action reveals the true nature
of the relationship between Congress and the American people.
Joshua Foxworth is a congressional
candidate in Texas. Facebook. Twitter.
