Published Oct 08, 2026 | 11:28 PM ⚊ Updated Oct 08, 2026 | 11:54 PM
Microsoft logo. (iStock)
In a major crackdown on employment-based immigration into the United States, the President Donald Trump-led administration has suspended Microsoft and several top IT giants, including Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Wipro, HCLTech, Cognizant, Capgemini, and Adobe, from the government’s Permanent Labour Certification Programme (PERM). The PERM is a mandatory prerequisite for sponsoring foreign workers for green cards.
Announcing the decision on Thursday, October 8, US Labour Secretary Keith Sonderling said, “I am hereby suspending from the Permanent Labour Certification Program some of the largest IT outsourcing firms in the world —Cognizant, Infosys, Tata, Wipro, HCL, and Capgemini— and also, due to multiple active federal investigations, USDOL is suspending Microsoft and Adobe from the program.”
Flanked by Vice President JD Vance and the head of the US Anti-Fraud Task Force, Sonderling claimed that the “historic action” is being taken as a “critical first step to end the misuse of the visa process and protect American Workers.”
“After a pipeline of systemic fraud has flooded our country for years with foreign labour, we’re putting an end to it today,” he said.
He accused the companies of misusing employment-visa programmes and taking jobs away from American workers.
“The suspensions of these companies from the permanent visa program are a HUGE WIN for hardworking Americans,” he said.
Vice President JD Vance said the decision followed an ongoing investigation and alleged that the H-1B visa program, which was meant to facilitate the companies to bring “the best of the best” employees from outside the US, has become “rife with fraud over the last several years, probably the last several decades.”
Vance alleged the programme was being used by the companies to bring “indentured servants” to the US to work at lower wages and replace American workers.
“If you are working as an H-1B visa in the United States of America, you’re earning $20,000 less than an American citizen hired in the same position. If you were brought in by one of these foreign outsourcing firms, you’re making $48,000 less than an American citizen in a similar position. So I’m sure that everybody here understands the game that is being played. You bring in indentured servants from outside the country, you lay off American workers and, if you’re a corporation, you make a ton of money by undercutting the wages of American workers, replacing them with people who frankly shouldn’t be in the United States of America to begin with,” he alleged.
He further alleged that Americans had been fed the lie that they were not fit for the jobs in their own country.
“To the American people, this visa fraud is a frontal assault on the idea that you deserve to inherit the jobs and the positions in your own country. Never believe the lie that Americans are not good enough to build a future for Americans. That’s what visa fraud tells you, it is a lie, and the President of the United States does not stand for it, and neither does anybody on this stage,” he said.
Announcing the suspension of Microsoft from the programme, based on an ongoing investigation, Vance called on the tech giant to employ American people if it wanted to “grow” in the US.
“Thanks to an ongoing investigation, we have decided to suspend the PERM program for Microsoft, which means they will no longer be able to take those H-1Bs and apply for permanent resident status within the United States of America,” he said.
Vice President JD Vance announces the suspension of the PERM Program for Microsoft:
“Thanks to an ongoing investigation, we have decided to suspend the PERM program for Microsoft, which means they will no longer be able to take those H-1Bs and apply for permanent resident status within the United States of America. Now our message to Microsoft and to any other foreign or domestic corporation is quite simple. We obviously want you to thrive in the United States of America. We want people to invest in the United States of America, particularly the American technology sector. We’re the biggest boosters of your industry. We want you to continue to grow and to employ a lot of people, but we want you to employ American workers. And so our message to Microsoft is, you’re great American company, but you’ve got to hire great American workers. You cannot lay off American workers and then replace them with foreign indentured servants.”
— Vice President JD Vance (@VP) October 8, 2026
“Now our message to Microsoft and to any other foreign or domestic corporation is quite simple. We obviously want you to thrive in the United States of America. We want people to invest in the United States of America, particularly the American technology sector. We’re the biggest boosters of your industry. We want you to continue to grow and to employ a lot of people, but we want you to employ American workers. And so our message to Microsoft is, you’re great American company, but you’ve got to hire great American workers. You cannot lay off American workers and then replace them with foreign indentured servants,” he added.
(Edited by Fayisa CA)
