Eric Thomas or Frances Cox 202-822-9491 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE April 13, 2007

Compete America Agrees with Representative Wu's Call for More U.S. Skilled Workers; Questions Tie to Pell Grants

Washington, D.C. – Compete America today issued the following statement regarding H.R. 1758 as introduced by Representative David Wu (D-OR) to amend the Immigration and Nationality Act.

“Compete America appreciates Representative Wu’s effort to temporarily alleviate the critical shortage of H-1B visas that U.S. employers use to hire highly educated foreign-born talent.  The coalition also agrees with Representative Wu that domestic sources of talent must be further developed to sustain long-term U.S. innovation leadership and supports directing funds toward that goal. 

“However, the bill's effort to directly tie H-1B visas to additional funding for Pell grants fails to recognize that H-1B visa fees paid by U.S. employers already go toward various programs designed to improve the U.S. pool of math and science workers.  In fact, Compete America companies already invest millions of dollars annually in scholarships and efforts to improve math and science education.  Since 1999, $1 billion in fees have been collected that have helped to fund scholarships for 40,000 math and science students.  The coalition always welcomes a discussion to ensure those funds are being used most effectively to boost U.S. talent, but does not agree that a direct linkage between additional visas and Pell grant funding would be either appropriate or effective under the current system.

“The perennial problems impeding the H-1B visa system reached a crisis point last week when the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) made the unprecedented announcement that the FY 2008 allotment of the visas was met on the very first day applications were accepted.  While this bill takes on the right issue, true reform requires a permanent and complete fix to the problems that plague both the H-1B visa and employment-based green card systems.

“Compete America looks forward to working with Representative Wu to encourage more U.S. students to pursue careers in critical fields and to help find lasting and meaningful ways to permanently reform the employment-based visa system and enhance U.S. competitiveness.”

For more information on how highly educated immigration benefits America, please visit www.competeamerica.org. 

Compete America (www.competeamerica.org) is a coalition of corporations, educators, research institutions and trade associations concerned about legal, employment-based immigration and committed to ensuring that the United States has the highly educated workforce necessary to ensure continued innovation, job creation and leadership in a worldwide economy.