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The Trump administration is suspending Microsoft and Adobe from a federal program that companies use to sponsor foreign workers for permanent residency, Vice President JD Vance said Thursday during a press conference.
Vance accused Microsoft of abusing the Permanent Labor Certification Program, or PERM. The program is an initial step that employers generally must complete before sponsoring a worker for an employment-based green card, requiring them to show that no qualified and available US workers could fill the role.
“If you do the math, for every worker that Microsoft laid off, they replaced that worker with one and a half foreign indentured servants,” Vance said.
Business Insider has reached out to Microsoft and Adobe for comment.
The announcement is the latest escalation for the administration against companies that rely on highly skilled foreign workers, particularly through the H-1B visa system. Microsoft is one of the biggest employers of H-1B workers in the US.
It was not immediately clear how long the suspension would last or what it would mean for Microsoft employees whose permanent-residency cases are already pending.
This is a developing story.
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Pranav Dixit is Business Insider’s Meta correspondent based in the San Francisco Bay Area. His reporting focuses on the company’s race to build and deploy AI, its shifting workplace and corporate strategy, and the consequences of its actions on users, employees, and the broader tech industry.Previously, Pranav was BuzzFeed News’ India-based technology correspondent, reporting on how Silicon Valley’s biggest companies affected the culture, politics, and society of South Asia. He was also a senior news editor at Engadget and led technology coverage at the Hindustan Times, one of India’s largest national newspapers. He moved to the United States in 2021 to be a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University and calls himself an "accidental expat." Pranav’s award-winning reporting has shed light on the human consequences of Big Tech’s quest for growth in emerging markets, and sparked widespread global conversations about the impact of American technology companies on the Global South. He has reported from rural India about gruesome lynchings sparked by Whatsapp misinformation, and documented the world's longest-running internet shutdown from Kashmir, a volatile geopolitical hotspot.Pranav’s work has been cited in dozens of books and research papers, as well as by major national and international publications. He has appeared on the national and international television, and on podcasts including Vox Media’s Land of the Giants. His writing has also appeared in The Guardian, Vox, Time, The Information, and Al Jazeera.Pranav keeps sources anonymous. Please use a non-work device to reach out.
