The agency in charge of H-1B visa applications, U.S. Homeland Security, will for the first time start sharing suspected labor-law violations with the federal Labor Department so the department can use a dormant power to launch its own workplace investigations, officials said.
For 15 years, U.S. labor secretaries have had the power to initiate an investigation into use of the H-1B, but “that authority has never been used,” U.S. Labor Secretary Eugene Scalia told President Donald Trump in a White House meeting Monday.
Under a memorandum of agreement between the two departments, Homeland Security, through its agency U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, “will refer suspected employer violations within the H-1B program to the Department of Labor,” the Labor Department said in a news release announcing the agreement Friday.
The information will come from Citizenship and Immigration’s adjudication of visa applications and its worksite visits, according to the release.
Information shared will be used for Labor Department investigations, the release said.
To date, the department has only launched investigations based on complaints from whistleblowers, said Ron Hira, a Howard University professor who studies the H-1B. Hira added, “I know of no cases where U.S. workers have prevailed.”
Although the agreement appears to open communication channels and may signal more robust oversight of employers who hire H-1Bs by the Labor Department, “it’s all about whether they actually do something with this authority,” Hira said.
