Senators Scheme to Import More Foreign Workers -Top CEOs, Mayors in Secret Meeting to Push Rubio's 'Job-Crushing' Legislation

Leo Hohmann / WND

A group of business leaders and progressive mayors is hosting a closed-door meeting in Washington today, pushing for a big increase in the number of foreign “guest workers” allowed into the United States to fill skilled positions.

The lobbying group, Partnership for a New American Economy, includes CEOs from Disney, Microsoft, Hewlett Packard and Marriott International among others, along with liberal mayors such as Julian Castro of San Antonio, Rahm Emanuel of Chicago and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

A complete roster of PNAE’s membership rolls can be viewed on its website.

The main issue to be discussed at the secret meeting is how to gain passage of the I-Squared bill sitting in the U.S. Senate, co-sponsored by Sens. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., Orin Hatch, R-Utah, Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., Chris Coons, D-Del., Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., and Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn.

The I-Squared bill would more than double the number of H-1B work visas handed out to foreigners with a bachelor’s degree or higher in a STEM field. The U.S. currently allows 65,000 of these visas per year but the corporate lobby is pushing Congress to up that number to at least 115,000 and perhaps as high as 200,000, claiming there is a shortage of American tech workers with STEM degrees (science, technology, engineering and math).

They say increasing the allotment of H1-B workers coming into the country from places like China, India, Iran, Pakistan, Iraq, Turkey, Yemen and Saudi Arabia would jump-start economic growth.

Opponents of I-Squared say the entire argument of this lobbying group is built around a false narrative. Groups such as the Center for Immigration Studies and the Economic Policy Institute point to statistics that show roughly half of Americans who graduate with STEM degrees have been unable to find work in a STEM field because there is already a glut of STEM workers. This is underscored by another stark trend – the utter lack of wage increases among tech workers over the past 10 years.

WND reported in depth on the H1-B worker scam last month.

Secret meeting on Capitol Hill today

According to a brochure obtained by WND, Friday’s lobbying event is co-sponsored by the American Immigration Lawyers Association, the Business Roundtable, the Council for Global Immigration, FWD.us, HR Policy Association, Information Technology Industry Council, National Association of Manufacturers, National Venture Capital Association, Semiconductor Industry Association, Society of Human Resources Management, and TechNet.

The brochure says the lobbying “briefing,” which includes lunch, is “closed to the press.” It was slated to begin at 11 a.m. Friday in the Senate Visitor’s Center Room 212-10. The title of the event is: “Understanding and Improving the High-Skilled H-1B Visa Program.”

Read more at WND:

http://www.wnd.com/2015/04/senators-scheme-to-import-more-foreign-workers/