174 Indians to sue Trump administration over H-1B visa ban

Families are being separated due to the visa ban

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A group of 174 Indian nationals, including seven minors, has filed a lawsuit against the recent presidential proclamation on H-1B that would prevent them from entering the United States or a visa would not be issued to them.

Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson at the US District Court in the District of Columbia issued a summons on Wednesday to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and acting Secretary of Homeland Security Chad F Wolf, along with Labour Secretary Eugene Scalia.

The lawsuit was filed in the US District Court on Tuesday.

“The proclamation 10052's H-1B/H-4 visa ban hurts the United States' economy, separates families and defies the Congress. While the two former points render it unseemly, the latter point renders it unlawful,” said the lawsuit filed by lawyer Wasden Banias on behalf of the 174 Indian nationals.

Young children are being separated from parents whose visas have expired and spouses who left while holding a valid visa and cannot return to the country due to travel restrictions created by the COVID-19 pandemic will be unable to return once the travel restrictions are lifted.

In his presidential proclamation on June 22, Trump temporarily suspended issuing of H-1B work visas till the end of the year.

The move was opposed by several tech companies including Apple, Microsoft, Intel and Google. The US Chambers of Commerce CEO Thomas Donohue on Thursday wrote a letter to Trump, expressing concern over the move to ban temporary work visas.

“In the administration of our nation's immigration system, we must remain mindful of the impact of foreign workers on the United States labour market, particularly in the current extraordinary environment of high domestic unemployment and depressed demand for labour,” said the proclamation issued by Trump.

In his proclamation, Trump said the overall unemployment rate in the United States nearly quadrupled between February and May of 2020—producing some of the most extreme unemployment ever recorded by the Bureau of Labour Statistics.

While the May rate of 13.3 per cent reflects a marked decline from April, millions of Americans remain out of work.

Forbes, which first reported the lawsuit filed by the Indian nationals, said the complaint points out that the Congress specified the rules under which H-1B visa holders could work in the US and balanced the interests of US workers and employers.

 “The complaint seeks to protect H-1B professionals, including those who have passed the labour certification process and possess approved immigrant petitions. Such individuals are waiting for their priority date to obtain permanent residence, a wait that can take many years for Indian nationals,” Forbes reported.

Meanwhile, several lawmakers urged Scalia on Tuesday to reverse the work visa ban.

“Throughout this administration, the president has continued to lament the alleged abuses of the immigration system while failing to address the systemic problems that have persisted and allowed businesses and employers to exploit and underpay immigrant workers, guest workers and American workers,” the lawmakers wrote.

H-1B visa is a non-immigrant visa that allows US companies to temporarily employ foreign workers in speciality occupations in areas such as information technology (IT), finance, accounting, architecture, engineering, mathematics, science, medicine, etc. A person holding an H-1B visa can apply for a social security number, open a bank account in the US, obtain a driver’s licence, buy/rent a car and own property. Those with an H-1B visa can also apply for a Green Card. An H-1B visa is initially issued for three years, but it can be extended for three more years.

The current ban is unlikely to have a major impact on Indian IT companies, according to Centrum Broking. The ban restricts the entry of individuals on an H-1B or H-4 visa unless they had a valid visa stamp when the ban came into effect, i.e., June 24, 2020.

The 4.5 lakh H-1B visa holders who are in the US currently won’t be impacted; stocks will be impacted, but not actual business, a report by Centrum Broking read.

On July 15, after US universities announced that they are moving court against the Trump administration that sought to deport foreign students, who would attend online lectures, Washington decided to rescind the decision.

(With PTI inputs)