Please oppose adding House provisions to America COMPETES Act.
I cannot understand why Democrats in the Senate want to include the anti-American worker provisions of H.R.4521, the America COMPETES Act, in the Senate version of the bill. The harmful provisions include:
- The creation of a W nonimmigrant visa program for foreign investors of start-ups and entrepreneurs, their families, and
essential
foreign workers who work for them; - A one-year path to an unlimited number of green cards for any W visa holder who meets certain investment and ownership stake requirements;
- An unlimited number of green cards for foreign citizens who hold a doctoral degree from a U.S. institution of higher learning -OR- an equivalent degree from a foreign university; and
- A 5-year program that creates a Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) green card for Hong Kong residents. The program would be capped at 5,000 per year, amounting to an additional 25,000 green cards over 5 years, authorization for unlimited refugee/asylee status for certain Hong Kong residents, a change in existing law to treat Hong Kong as a separate state from China in determining per-country limits for existing green card categories, and TPS for Hong Kong residents currently in the U.S., regardless of immigration status.
Giving a blank check to foreign workers with a doctoral degree will only make it more difficult for highly-educated Americans, such as STEM workers, to find jobs in their fields of study. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, among the 50 million employed college graduates ages 25 to 64 in 2019, 37% reported a bachelor’s degree in science or engineering but only 14% worked in a STEM occupation. This means that less than a third (28%) of STEM-educated workers work in a STEM job. The statistics are far worse for minority students, where statistics show that minorities already struggle to gain employment. The Computing Research Association’s data shows that 2% of technology workers at seven Silicon Valley companies that have released staffing numbers are Black and only 3% are Hispanic.
It’s clear that these provisions would harm American workers of all education levels and would allow China to send its mainland citizens to the United States posing as Hongkongers fleeing oppression.
Please oppose the Senate version of H.R. 4521, the America COMPETES Act, if these provisions are included.
Greg Raven, Apple Valley, CA
