US Techworkers, a subsidiary of the Institute for Sound Public Policy (IfSPP), filed a complaint with the Department of Justice this week that showed two Chicago-based nonprofits colluded with companies across the country to hire H-1B Visa workers over American workers.
The complaint, filed against P33 and Techicago (nonprofit agencies based Illinois) and their corporate partners, showed how they willfully and knowingly sought to hire H-1B workers for IT positions in Chicago and across the country. This hiring push, called Chicago H1B Connect, listed hiring advertisements specifically for foreign nationals that are working in the United States under the H-1B visa program.
This is a clear violation of federal US labor laws. Specifically, it’s a textbook case of country of origin discrimination, as outlined by the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, a federal agency created by Congress in 1964 to enforce Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. These laws were set up to protect Americans of every racial, ethnic, religious and sexual persuasion from discrimination at the workplace.
In recent years. global corporations headquartered in the US have turned to Visa workers for IT staffing as a way to maximize profits. Here in Connecticut, Governer Ned Lamont is using taxpayer money to award grants to companies that have repeatedly violated US labor laws and have a long history of discriminating against American workers. We’ve document countless examples of this on this site.
One Stamford, CT, attorney explained how Techicago and their partner companies violated the law.
“According to US employment laws, you can’t hire someone based on their racial, ethnic or nationality. But that’s exactly what these companies were doing,” she said.
“Imagine if a company created a Want Ad that sought to hire a caucasian Christian man in his 20s and 30s for an Accounting position and added No Women and Minorities Need Apply. But these companies were specifically targeting Indian nationals, because they could pay them a fraction of what an American makes and force them to work long hours.”
As part of their complaint, Kevin Lynn, IfSPP’s Executive Director, described a specific example of what they found in one of the cases it monitored in the complaint against P33 and Techicago, which clearly illustrates how Americans are being discriminated in hiring simply because they are Americans.
“A qualified U.S. worker who applied for an IT job at the University of Chicago never received a return call. But when a Southeast Asian candidate and H-1B worker submitted an identical resume for the same job, the university promptly responded with interest.“
Kevin Lynn, Executive Director for the Institute for Sound Public Policy
A total of 45 companies use Techicago as a pipeline for foreign workers, including John Deere, Caterpiller, Discover Financial Services, University of Chicago. These are name-global companies and institutions with assets totaling hundreds of billions of dollars.
If found guilty, all of them, including Techicago, will be subject to fines as a result of this complaint that could total as much as $10 million.
The DOJ has ruled in favor of Americans in the past, who were able to prove that they were discriminated against in hiring. Bob Heath, a legendary activist for American IT workers, won dozens of cases like this without any legal representation before he succumbed to cancer last year.
Kevin Lynn, the founder of US Techworkers, has secured employment justice for Americans from New England to California since he started the organization in 2009. Most notably, his lobbying convinced President Donald Trump to save the jobs of hundreds of IT workers at the Tennessee Valley Authority in 2020. (In the photo below, Kevin sits at a table with President Trump (at right), as he signs an order that saved American jobs.)
To help US Techworkers continue their fight, please consider making a donation. Their efforts have made a huge difference in IT hiring practices on American soil.