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‘Can't replace American workers with foreign servants’: Why Vance's H-1B visa axe fell hard on Microsoft
JD Vance said Microsoft laid off around 6,000 American workers last year.
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US vice president JD Vance has suspended Microsoft from a green-card programme that helps companies sponsor foreign employees for permanent residency. This follows scrutiny over the tech giant’s hiring practices and its use of the H-1B visa system.
Vance said Microsoft laid off around 6,000 American workers in 2025. He also cited more than 6,000 H-1B approvals and nearly 3,000 green cards linked to the company. He said the numbers raised serious questions about how American workers were being treated.
Adobe was also suspended. So were major IT firms including Cognizant, Infosys, Tata, Wipro, HCL and Capgemini.
Deep Dive
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Why Microsoft?
“There has been no company in the United States, unfortunately, that has abused this system more than Microsoft,” Vance said.
The US government is examining whether companies used the immigration system while qualified American workers were available. Microsoft filed 3,682 PERM applications. Nearly 1,000 of those applications were for positions similar to jobs held by American workers who had been laid off.
PERM is a required step for most employment-based green cards. Under the process, an employer must establish that there is no qualified, willing and available US worker for a specific job.
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Vance said, “our message to Microsoft is, you’re great American company, but you’ve got to hire great American workers. You cannot lay off American workers and then replace them with foreign indentured servants," as quoted by AP.
What happens to Microsoft’s applications
US labour secretary Keith Sonderling announced the suspension on Thursday. He said the Department of Labour would not accept new permanent labour certification applications involving the companies. It would also stop processing their pending applications.
Sonderling said the action covered some of the biggest IT outsourcing companies in the world. He said the companies had collectively requested almost three million foreign workers since 2009.
According to Sonderling, they had received more than 230,000 H-1B visa approvals and more than 100,000 permanent labour certifications.
He said the figures represented hundreds of thousands of jobs that had been taken from American workers.
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How it affects Indians
The H-1B programme allows US companies to employ skilled foreign workers. Indians make up a large share of the H-1B workforce.
Indian IT companies -- Cognizant, Infosys, Tata, Wipro and HCL are among the companies suspended, so their employees and prospective green-card applicants could also face consequences.
Vance also announced investigations into nine universities, including Harvard, Yale and Stanford. The administration is examining allegations that some universities brought in international students to undercut American wages.
Labor Inspector General Anthony D'Esposito said subpoenas had already been served. He said investigators would examine whether foreign influence, improper financial relationships or visa abuse were affecting federally funded research.
