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New 'guest worker' restrictions sought
Tuesday, November 22, 2005

By PAUL BRUBAKER
HERALD NEWS


PATERSON - It's about protecting American jobs for Americans.

That was one of the messages on Monday, as Rep. Bill Pascrell Jr., D-Paterson, announced his Defend the American Dream Act, a bill that would tighten restrictions around the federal H-1B visa program.

The visas have allowed companies to temporarily hire educated, highly skilled foreign "guest workers," often for half of what Americans in the same positions would earn.

"This is not an anti-immigrant stunt, but American workers must come first," said Pascrell, at the curbside news conference in front of the state Labor Department building that attracted 25 people on a gray, chilly day.

"Corporations would rather wait six months to fill a position in order to hire cheap labor from abroad rather than looking for American workers first," he said.

Sona Shah, 34, a naturalized American citizen born in India, said that she was displaced from her computer program analyst job at ADP Wilco, a financial services company, by the hiring of H1-B workers.

"I witnessed at my company the degradation of both sides of the work force - foreign and American," said Shah, who has filed a discrimination suit against ADP Wilco. Americans lost jobs to foreign workers, and H-1B visa workers were denied prevailing wages, she said.

Pascrell's bill includes provisions such as requiring employers to pay prevailing wages, and to publicly post open positions for 30 days before hiring an H-1B visa holder.

Representatives of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers, a Washington-based professional association, and The Organization for the Rights of American Workers also attended Pascrell's news conference.