U.S. bars Microsoft, Adobe and others from visa program

Skip to Content News Archives Economy Defence Energy Oil & Gas Renewables Electric Vehicles Mining Commodities Agriculture Real Estate Mortgages Mortgage Rates Finance Banking Insurance Fintech Cryptocurrency Defence Work Wealth Smart Money Wealth Management Investor Personal Finance Family Finance Retirement Taxes High Net Worth FP Comment Executive Women Puzzmo Newsletters Financial Times Business Essentials More Innovation Information Technology FP500 Podcasts Small Business Lives Told Tails Told Shopping Financial Post Store Obituaries Place a Notice Advertising Advertising With Us Advertising Solutions Postmedia Ad Manager Sponsorship Requests Classifieds Place a Classifieds ad Working Profile Settings My Subscriptions My Offers Newsletters Customer Service FAQ News Economy Energy Mining Real Estate Finance Defence Work Wealth Investor FP Comment Executive Women Puzzmo Newsletters Financial Times Business Essentials This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below.HomeWorkU.S. bars Microsoft, Adobe and others from visa programThe firms, either based in India or with large operations there, are often called outsourcers for their role offering contract IT work to other businessesAuthor of the article:Jennifer A. Dlouhy, Matt Day and Alicia A. CaldwellA man walks past the logo of the U.S. tech company Microsoft in front of its office in Beijing on September 22, 2026. Photo by ADEK BERRY / AFP via Getty ImagesThe Trump administration accused Microsoft Corp., Adobe Inc. and a half-dozen other companies of abusing a U.S. worker visa program and suspended them indefinitely from a longstanding immigration initiative that’s served as a crucial talent pipeline for Silicon Valley and Wall Street.THIS CONTENT IS RESERVED FOR SUBSCRIBERS ONLYSubscribe now to read the latest news in your city and across Canada.Exclusive articles from Barbara Shecter, Joe O'Connor, Gabriel Friedman, and others.Daily content from Financial Times, the world's leading global business publication.Unlimited online access to read articles from Financial Post, National Post and 15 news sites across Canada with one account.National Post ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition to view on any device, share and comment on.Daily puzzles, including the New York Times Crossword.SUBSCRIBE TO UNLOCK MORE ARTICLESSubscribe now to read the latest news in your city and across Canada.Exclusive articles from Barbara Shecter, Joe O'Connor, Gabriel Friedman and others.Daily content from Financial Times, the world's leading global business publication.Unlimited online access to read articles from Financial Post, National Post and 15 news sites across Canada with one account.National Post ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition to view on any device, share and comment on.Daily puzzles, including the New York Times Crossword.REGISTER / SIGN IN TO UNLOCK MORE ARTICLESCreate an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience.Access articles from across Canada with one account.Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments.Enjoy additional articles per month.Get email updates from your favourite authors.THIS ARTICLE IS FREE TO READ REGISTER TO UNLOCK.Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience.Access articles from across Canada with one accountShare your thoughts and join the conversation in the commentsEnjoy additional articles per monthGet email updates from your favourite authorsSign In or Create an AccountThe suspensions, announced Thursday by Vice President JD Vance and Labor Secretary Keith Sonderling, also targeted information technology services giants Cognizant Technology Solutions Corp., Infosys Ltd., Tata, Wipro Ltd., HCL Technologies Ltd. and Capgemini SE. Those firms, either based in India or with large operations there, are often called outsourcers for their role offering contract IT work to other businesses.This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below.At a briefing in Washington, Sonderling said there were multiple federal investigations under way into the use of a system that allows U.S. employers to sponsor foreign workers for permanent residency.FP Work touches on HR strategy, labour economics, office culture, technology and more.By signing up you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc.A welcome email is on its way. If you don't see it, please check your junk folder.The next issue of Work will soon be in your inbox.We encountered an issue signing you up. Please try again“We are cutting off the head of the snake — the companies that enabled this abuse for decades,” Sonderling told reporters at Thursday’s briefing.Vance singlled out Microsoft, the world’s third most-valuable company, for what he characterized as exploitation of the program. “There has been no company in the United States, unfortunately, that has abused this system more than Microsoft,” he said.In a statement, Microsoft defended its use of visa programs and said that it looked forward to providing the administration with additional information. Adobe and the Indian companies named by Vance and Sonderling didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.Shares of Microsoft fell more than 1.3 per cent in New York trading Thursday, while Cognizant reversed earlier losses and was up more than five per cent. Shares in Indian IT services firms including Tata Consultancy Services Ltd. and Infosys rose Friday.This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below.Vance’s comments assailing Microsoft came hours before U.S. President Donald Trump honoured the company’s chief executive officer, Satya Nadella, with a National Medal of Technology and Innovation at a summit in Washington intended to spotlight U.S. scientific leadership. Just last week, Nadella joined other tech industry leaders at a White House luncheon to discuss safeguards for artificial intelligence.“Microsoft is a great American company, and we have a great relationship with them, they do a lot of important things,” Vance said. “Our message to Microsoft is not that we want to harm your company. It’s that we want your company to thrive, but we want it to thrive by employing and empowering your fellow Americans.”The moves announced by Vance and Sonderling take aim at the Permanent Labor Certification Program, or PERM, which allows companies to sponsor a foreigner who has been working in the U.S. under the H-1B and other visa holders to become a legal permanent resident, the first step to becoming a U.S. citizen.Silicon Valley’s reliance on foreign workers has long been a flashpoint in the debate over immigration. Since Trump’s return to office last year, the administration has seized on those concerns and pressed tech giants to do more to train and hire U.S. workers.This advertisement has not loaded yet.This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below.As part of that effort, Trump has moved to make it harder for companies to use H-1B visas to attract foreign talent, targeting a major source of workers for the industry. The changes have included proposals for US$100,000 filing fees for most candidates and tightening the rules of how the H-1B visas are awarded in an annual lottery, giving priority to companies offering the highest salaries.In his remarks, Vance urged the U.S.-based companies to shift their policies to employ more U.S. workers.“Stop defrauding the American worker. Stop importing an indentured servant to do a job that an American worker would happily do,” the vice president said.The suspensions marked the latest move by the Trump administration to crack down on both legal and undocumented pathways to migration, an effort that’s narrowing a key path linking global scientific and engineering workers with U.S. companies across a range of sectors.In a nearly simultaneous announcement Thursday, the administration also said it had opened investigations into foreign exchange visa holders at nine top colleges including Harvard University, Stanford University and MIT. The sweeping fraud probe is focused on J-1 visas, which at universities are often held by international PhD candidates and visiting scholars.This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below.During the Thursday summit where Nadella was honored by Trump, the administration announced plans to inject more than US$100 million into education programs for American researchers in science, technology, engineering and math. The initiative seeks to boost the number of scientific researchers who are American citizens and reduce the reliance on foreign talent by companies and universities.Representative Pramila Jayapal, a Washington Democrat, faulted the administration’s decision and said that the PERM program has a clearly delineated process that’s designed to make it beneficial to the U.S. economy and to ensure that it doesn’t take jobs away from American citizens.“You don’t fix a broken immigration system by taking a hammer to legal immigration,” Jayapal said in a statement. “Targeting Microsoft or the PERM program in this way simply undermines legal immigration and weakens America’s ability to innovate.”Companies like Microsoft often use the H-1B program to bring in foreign workers and then help some of them remain in the country through the system. Through the third quarter of the 2026 federal fiscal year, which ended Sept. 30, Microsoft had filed about 1,680 such petitions for permanent status, according to Department of Labor data.This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below.In its statement following the suspensions, Microsoft said that of the 6,000 total H-1B visa applications it submitted in the most recent fiscal year, 80 per cent were to extend or change the status of current company employees. “These were not to hire new people. The remaining filings for new employees were for individuals already legally in the United States who decided to come work for us, and they equal only one per cent of our U.S. Workforce,” the company said on its corporate blog.The Permanent Labor Certification Program is a major retention tool for Microsoft, which has a reputation for helping employees with work visas seek permanent legal status. The Redmond, Washington-based company has long bolstered its U.S.-based workforce with employees in the country on H-1B visas, as well as visas for intracompany transfers and recent university graduates.Outside the tech industry, Wall Street firms and telecommunications companies have also relied on the H-1B program through their use of IT contractors from staffing and outsourcing agencies. Staffing companies have developed a lucrative business recruiting programmers and other technology professionals from abroad and placing them with U.S. clients.This advertisement has not loaded yet.This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below.In the first nine months of the 2026 fiscal year Microsoft was the fifth highest user of H-1B visas, with 3,688. The company trailed behind Apple Inc., Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services and Amazon.com Inc., according to H-1B employer data published by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Over the last decade, Microsoft has used nearly 54,000 such visas, ranking fourth among the largest users, behind Amazon, Infosys and Tata, according to USCIS data.For years, TCS and other Indian outsourcers were among the heaviest users of H-1B visas, regularly drawing fire for taking over the tech operations at major U.S. companies and then bringing in temporary Indian workers at salaries below their American counterparts. But the Indian companies have pulled back in recent years in the face of political backlash and the Trump administration’s move to hike fees on H-1B visas to US$100,000.Nasscom, a lobbying group that represents Indian IT services companies, said that many of those businesses have significantly reduced their dependence on H-1B visas, a shift that has translated into fewer requests for permanent status.This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below.“While the decision affects a specific immigration pathway, Nasscom has consistently maintained that immigration and skilled talent mobility are two distinct issues and should not be viewed through the same lens,” the group said in a statement.Even though the tech industry has embraced Trump in his second term, due to policies that have sought to ease their tax and regulatory burden and draw investments to build out AI infrastructure, the administration’s immigration crackdown has been a sore spot.Curbing the flow of foreign researchers and scientists threatens to undermine U.S. innovation and competitiveness in the long term, according to Ken Mahoney, president and chief executive officer at Mahoney Asset Management.“The United States has spent decades establishing itself as the global leader in technology because of its ability to attract some of the brightest minds from around the world,” Mahoney said. “Restricting access to that talent could halt innovation possibly, and you never know who is out there coming up with big ideas that you lose access to.”With assistance from Liam Knox, Sarah Frier, Meghashyam Mali and Erik WassonThis advertisement has not loaded yet.Notice for the Postmedia NetworkThis website uses cookies to personalize your content (including ads), and allows us to analyze our traffic. 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