JD Vance announces MASSIVE crackdown on companies and universities replacing Americans with foreigners

Vice President JD Vance says Microsoft and other firms have been suspended from a program temporary H-1B visa holders often use to gain permanent residency in the United States

The Trump administration has heavily criticized companies for allegedly abusing the H-1B program, replacing Americans at high-paying jobs with foreign workers.

'You cannot lay off American workers and then replace them with foreign indentured servants.'

"Our message to Microsoft is, you're a great American company, but you've got to hire great American workers," Vance said at a press conference Thursday. "You cannot lay off American workers and then replace them with foreign indentured servants."

Labor Secretary Keith Sonderling said Microsoft, Adobe, Cognizant, Infosys, Tata, Wipro, HCL, and Capgemini have been suspended from access to the Permanent Labor Certification Program that allows employers to sponsor H-1B visa holders for permanent residency.

Sonderling said that the suspended firms have requested nearly 3 million foreign workers since 2009. The firms also had more than 230,000 H-1B visa approvals and more than 100,000 permanent labor certifications.

Microsoft alone had laid off 6,000 American workers just last year while receiving 6,300 H-1B visas for foreign workers and nearly 3,000 green cards, according to Vance.

RELATED: How the H-1B visa replaces American workers

Vance added that they will suspend PERM access for Microsoft "until they show that they are going to get serious about putting American workers first."

The administration has also served subpoenas and opened investigations into alleged visa abuse at Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Brown, the University of Pittsburgh, UC Davis, Caltech, Arizona State, and MIT.

"Nobody will be getting a free pass because their name is carved into an expensive building," said Labor Department Inspector General Anthony D’Esposito.

Microsoft responded in a lengthy press release that claimed the vast majority of their H-1B applications in the last fiscal year were not new arrivals but people already in the U.S., or re-applications for current workers.

"We believe in the strength and talent of the American workforce. That is why the vast majority of Microsoft employees in the United States are Americans," read the statement in part.

"Microsoft only files H-1B petitions for those who meet the rigorous standards of this visa category," the company added. "We pay our employees some of the highest compensation in the tech sector, and our wages are among the highest of all H-1B filings. We pay our H-1B employees the same as any other employees doing comparable work."

Editor's note: This article has been edited after publication to include the Microsoft press release.

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