A California court ruled Tuesday, December 1, in favor of Silicon Valley companies angry at the work visa freeze decided by President Donald Trump in June.
"The court rejected the Trump administration's attempt to put in the fast-track restrictions and bypass the normal public process
,
"
said the Bay Area Council, an organization that represents the interests of San Francisco Bay Area companies, where most of the tech giants are located.
Read also: Trump freezes green cards and many work visas until 2021
Last June, Donald Trump, whose presidential campaign was going through a bad patch, announced the freezing of green cards and certain work visas, including the H-1B, widely used in the IT and digital sector.
His decree had sparked an outcry from bosses of Google, Apple and other companies, and legal action from organizations like the American Chamber of Commerce and the Bay Area Council.
The government has failed
"to demonstrate that it had good reason to dispense"
with the administrative requirements and procedures required, the California court said in its decision in favor of the plaintiffs.
Judge Jeffrey White has ruled to suspend two government rules that would have forced companies to pay more for employees hired with H1-B visas and to restrict the types of jobs that qualify for that visa.
Government lawyers have cited the Covid-19 pandemic and the economic crisis to justify bypassing the classic administrative process.
An argument rejected by the judge, who did not see
"extreme urgency"
.
Read also: United States: judge suspends certain visa restrictions imposed by Trump
In June, Donald Trump assured that he wanted to help American workers, faced with the sharp rise in unemployment linked to the epidemic.
But the hardening of migration policy
"will prevent US companies in the tech and elsewhere to recruit men and women they need to strengthen their staff, boost the economy and fuel innovation"
, had indignant Jason Oxman, chairman of the Information Technology Industry Council, a trade association that includes more than 70 companies, including Apple, Amazon, Google, Facebook and Microsoft.
"In the San Francisco Bay Area, 40-45% of technology companies were founded by immigrant entrepreneurs
,
"
said the Bay Area Council in its press release Tuesday.
"Of 91 unicorns
(unlisted companies valued at over a billion, editor's note),
recently surveyed across the country, more than half had at least one immigrant founder."
