Obama said America isn’t defined by borders. I guess this is why he appointed the feckless Janet “the system worked” Napolitano to lead Homeland Security. The government, which issues work visas, has no clue how many foreign workers are in the U.S.
This is the same group of idiots who will be running the health care system. Makes me feel secure. Don’t you?
(CNSNews) – No one knows how many foreign workers with H-1B visas are in the United States at any given time because of “limitations in agency data,†a new report says.
Congress created the H-1B visa program in 1990 so U.S. employers could hire temporary, skilled foreign workers to give their companies a competitive edge. Many H-1B workers come here to work in high-tech fields.
By law, the number of foreign workers holding H-1B visas is capped, currently at 65,000.
But according to the Government Accountability Office, “The total number of H-1B workers in the U.S. at any one time — and information about the length of their stay — is unknown, because (1) data systems among the various agencies that process such individuals are not linked so individuals cannot be readily tracked, and (2) H-1B workers are not assigned a unique identifier that would allow for tracking them over time–particularly if and when their visa status changes.â€
The report says the Homeland Security Department is responsible for tracking the number of H-1B petitions and the number of H-1B visas issued, but “it cannot precisely do so.â€
Homeland Security is a dangerous agency ran by a bunch of inept political appointees. They claim we can’t secure the border and now they can’t even keep track of legal immigrants working here in the U.S.
GAO explained that H-1B petition approvals are captured in Homeland Security’s CLAIMS 3 data system. But visas for H-1B workers living abroad at the time of approval are captured by a State Department data system that is not linked to CLAIMS 3. Further, information on visa holders who actually enter or exit the United States is tracked by Homeland Security’s US-VISIT program, which is not linked to CLAIMS 3, either.
Moreover, “Because these data systems do not use a unique, person-centric identifier for H-1B workers, Homeland Security cannot determine, for example, how many approved H-1B workers living abroad actually received an H-1B visa and/or ultimately entered the country,†the GAO report says.
