WASHINGTON – U.S. Senators Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and Susan Collins (R-ME) urged the Biden administration to address the current green card, visa, and work permit application backlogs to help combat ongoing workforce shortages.
“As businesses across the country continue to face workforce shortages, taking long-term efforts to decrease processing backlogs and delays will help ensure that employers will be able to find the help that they need,” the senators wrote to Department of Labor Secretary Marty Walsh. “Several immigrant visas require employers to get approval from the Department of Labor before the employer can submit a visa petition to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). The H-1B, H-2B and employment-based visa programs all require the Department of Labor to conduct a prevailing wage determination to make sure that hiring a foreign worker will not negatively impact wages and working conditions of similar employees. As of May, some employers who filed applications for a prevailing wage determination in November were still waiting for their applications to be processed.”
The senators continued later in the letter: “As communities across the country continue to face workforce shortages, it is important that the Department of Labor has the resources it needs to decrease processing times.”
Klobuchar has led efforts to address workforce shortages. At a Judiciary Committee hearing in March, she highlighted ways to strengthen America’s workforce and maintain its global competitive edge, pointing to how challenges such as the green card backlog hurt American companies’ ability to recruit and retain workers.
Klobuchar joined a bipartisan group of colleagues in urging the Biden administration to quickly increase the number of available H-2B visas for seasonal workers. Following the Senators’ push, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Department of Labor (DOL) announced in May that a temporary rule had been finalized to authorize an additional 35,000 H-2B visas. Minnesota businesses, including the tourism and forestry sectors, rely on temporary workers during their busiest seasons.
In May of 2021, Klobuchar introduced bipartisan legislation with Senators Susan Collins (R-ME), Jacky Rosen (D-NV), and Joni Ernst (R-IA), to increase the number of doctors able to work in rural and medically underserved communities. The Conrad State 30 and Physician Access Reauthorization Act would allow international doctors to remain in the U.S. upon completing their residency under the condition that they practice in rural or underserved areas.
The full text of the letter is available HERE and below:
Dear Secretary Walsh:
We write to inquire about steps that the Department of Labor is taking to address delays in the processing of prevailing wage determinations for immigrant and non-immigrant visas. As businesses across the country continue to face workforce shortages, taking long-term efforts to decrease processing backlogs and delays will help ensure that employers will be able to find the help that they need.
Several immigrant visas require employers to get approval from the Department of Labor before the employer can submit a visa petition to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). The H-1B, H-2B and employment-based visa programs all require the Department of Labor to conduct a prevailing wage determination to make sure that hiring a foreign worker will not negatively impact wages and working conditions of similar employees.
As of May, some employers who filed applications for a prevailing wage determination in November were still waiting for their applications to be processed. These delays make it hard for businesses to have the confidence that they will have the workers they need. This is especially true for seasonal businesses that have a small window of time where they can make all the revenue they need for the entire year. Delays of even a few days can have devastating impacts on their ability to stay open.
We appreciate the steps that the administration has taken to implement short-term fixes, including temporarily allowing H-2B workers who are already in the United States to start working once their H-2B petition and temporary labor certification have been received by USCIS.
As communities across the country continue to face workforce shortages, it is important that the Department of Labor has the resources it needs to decrease processing times.
Accordingly, we ask that you answer the following questions by July 29, 2022:
1. What challenges or constraints has the Department faced in making prevailing wage determinations for immigrant and non-immigrant visa applicants?
2. What steps has the department taken, and what steps does it plan to take, to decrease prevailing wage processing times?
3. What role does the Department envision the Occupational Employment Statistics program playing in improving processing times?
4. What support can Congress provide to facilitate prevailing wage processing?
We appreciate your attention to this important matter.
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