US Suspends IT Giants Like Microsoft and Adobe from Participating in the Green Card Program for Technical Talent

On October 8, the Trump administration formally suspended several major IT companies, including Microsoft and Adobe, from participating in the green card program aimed at helping foreign technical workers obtain permanent residency in the United States, and accused the relevant companies of fraudulent activities.

The US Secretary of Labor, Keith Sundling, clearly stated that the government will no longer accept any new or pending permanent labor certification applications involving these companies. The affected companies also include well-known service and tech giants such as Capgemini, Cognizant, HCL, Infosys, Tata Group, and Wipro.

Vice President JD Vance emphasized at a press conference that companies must prioritize hiring American local employees, and also revealed that the government will conduct investigations into nine prestigious universities, including Harvard, Yale, and Stanford, to examine whether they are misusing international student programs to suppress local workers' wages.

As one of the largest user groups of H-1B visas and subsequent green card conversions, nearly three-quarters of approved H-1B visas have gone to Indian technical professionals in recent years. In response to the administrative intervention, Microsoft quickly responded, pointing out that the majority of its employees are Americans. Of the approximately 6,000 H-1B applications submitted in the previous fiscal year, 80% were used for the renewal or change of status for existing employees, rather than hiring new employees; the remaining new employee applications accounted for only 1% of the total number of American employees, and all met strict visa standards and were entitled to equal pay for equal work.

As the global competition for AI and hard technology talent enters a feverish stage, the tightening of high-tech enterprise technical immigration channels by the United States may reshape the global flow of high-tech talent and bring far-reaching impacts on the core R&D teams of large technology companies.