US lawmakers, IT industry against ending work permit to H-4 visa holders

Influential lawmakers and representatives of the American IT industry, including Facebook, have opposed the Trump administration’s proposed plan to withdraw work permits to the spouses of H-1B visa holders, a majority of whom are Indian professionals. The opposition to the Trump administration’s plans comes a day after the American media reported a letter from the US Citizenship and Immigration Services about its decision to terminate the Obama-era regulation that granted work permits to H-4 visa holders, spouses of H1-B visa holders, a majority of whom are Indian professionals, and are mostly women.

“Rescinding this rule and removing tens of thousands of people from the American workforce would be devastating to their families, and would hurt our economy,” Silicon Valley-based FWD. US, which was founded by top IT companies like Facebook, Google and Microsoft, said in a report released on Wednesday.         

“This policy is important because it allows certain individuals to secure gainful employment without having to wait for their spouses to receive permanent residency, many of whom are experiencing a processing backlog of more than a decade,” FWD.US argued.              

Roughly 80 per cent of H-4 visa holders are women, and many had successful jobs and held advanced degrees in their native countries before coming to the US with their H-1B spouses, it said.           

Without the H-4 work authorisation rule, the spouses of H-1B high-skilled employees would be unable to work legally and contribute financially to their households and communities, as well as pay taxes on their wages, unless they had alternate immigration avenues for work authorisation, FWD.US added.