FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Katie Barrows
Communications Director
P: 202-549-5991
kbarrows@dpeaflcio.org

WASHINGTON, March 28, 2023 - Yesterday, Senators Dick Durbin (D-Illinois) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) reintroduced the H-1B and L-1 Visa Reform Act. Department for Professional Employees, AFL-CIO (DPE) President Jennifer Dorning released the following statement in response to the Senate reintroduction of the bill:

“I commend Senators Durbin and Grassley for reintroducing the H-1B and L-1 Visa Reform Act, which will improve the H-1B visa program so that it works for U.S. professionals and the people employed on H-1B visas, not just employers. I also thank Senators Blumenthal, Brown, Sanders, and Tuberville for joining as original co-sponsors. 

When used as intended, the H-1B program can play an important role in our economy by attracting skilled and talented workers to the United States. Unfortunately, today employers regularly misuse the H-1B program to lower standards for middle-class professionals, outsource and offshore good jobs, and pay H-1B workers below market wages in arrangements where employers control their lives. 

The bipartisan H-1B and L-1 Visa Reform Act will go a long way toward reforming these visa programs by lifting wages, promoting worker empowerment, and ensuring that employees can exercise their workplace rights free of retaliation or coercion. 

I also urge the Biden administration to take administrative actions to help fix the broken H-1B program, including adopting a wage-based visa allocation process and updating the prevailing wage levels.

DPE renews its call for Congress to pass the H-1B and L-1 Visa Reform Act and send it to President Biden’s desk to become law.”

About DPE

The Department for Professional Employees, AFL-CIO (DPE) is a coalition of 24 unions representing over four million professional and technical union members. DPE affiliate unions represent professionals in over 300 occupations in education and healthcare; science, engineering, and technology; legal, business, and management; media, entertainment, and the arts; and public administration.