WASHINGTON — Senator Chuck Grassley and Congressman John Hostettler today said that the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services does not have a sufficient process in place to adhere to the federal law that prohibits approval of more than of 65,000 H-1B Non-Immigrant visas.
Grassley and Hostettler released a Department of Homeland Security Inspector General report that confirmed there was not a process in place to stop issuing H1-B visas once the cap was exceeded. The report also showed that once the number of H1-B visas approved was close to the 65,000 visa cap, there was no effort to slow down or stop the acceptance of applications.
"Citizenship and Immigration Services ignored a direct Congressional mandate. It boggles my mind that with our computer technology, CIS can’t count to 65,000. Bureaucrats are playing a guessing game, and show no shame. Congress put these restrictions in place to help American workers and we expect them to be followed," Grassley said.
"I was disappointed that our letter, which asked for specific answers to specific questions, was in essence ignored. We will continue to insist that CIS disclose specifically if federal laws were in fact violated. It is critical that we get to the bottom of this as soon as possible," Hostettler said.
Despite the Inspector General’s report, Grassley and Hostettler have now asked for further details about CIS actions prior to reaching the cap. They have asked for email exchanges and communication that took place in the days and weeks leading up to the congressional mandated cap of 65,000 petitions.
The Inspector General report was requested after Grassley and Hostettler learned that CIS accepted and approved more than 72,000 H-1B visa petitions for fiscal 2005. Specifically, the report said that the Agency lacks the technology and methodology to accurately count the approved visas. It also said that the traditional business practice of counting is flawed and will continue to cause an overcount of H-1B visas. The report shows that CIS would prefer to overcount rather than to undercount, despite federal law prohibiting it. Recommendations for improvement were suggested by the Inspector General, but these problem areas currently remain unresolved.
Grassley is a senior member of the Senate Judiciary Committee and Hostettler is Chairman of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security and Claims.
A copy of the Inspector General report can be found by clicking here.