Trump admin. blocks Microsoft and Adobe from sponsoring H

The Trump administration has halted new and pending green-card applications involving Microsoft, Adobe and six IT services companies, widening its crackdown on skilled-worker immigration. Vice President JD Vance announced the move Thursday at a press conference, accusing Microsoft of abusing the visa system and prioritizing foreign workers over Americans. Labor Secretary Keith Sonderling said the suspension covers permanent labor certification applications involving all eight companies. Cognizant, Infosys, Tata, Wipro, HCL Technologies and Capgemini will be barred from the program, Sonderling said at the press conference. “Our message to Microsoft is: You're a great American company, but you've got to hire great American workers,” Vance, who leads the administration’s anti-fraud task force , said at the press conference. The announcement is the result of an administrationwide effort to crack down on alleged abuse of work visa systems. Vance on Thursday accused tech giant Microsoft of fraud, citing the company’s decision to eliminate thousands of workers earlier this year. U.S. tech companies often rely on H-1B visas to hire foreign-born workers with specialized technical skills. “For every worker that Microsoft laid off, they replaced that worker with one-and-a-half foreign indentured servants,” Vance said. A spokesperson for Microsoft in a statement to POLITICO said the company would provide the Trump administration with further information the immigration status of its employees: “Of the approximately 6,000 H-1B visa applications we submitted in the last fiscal year, 80% were to extend or change the status of existing Microsoft employees. These were not to hire new people.” The spokesperson added that the company “only files H-1B petitions for those who meet the rigorous standards of this visa category” and H-1B visa holders are paid the same as other employees doing “comparable work.” Spokespeople for Adobe, Cognizant, Infosys, Tata, Wipro, HCL Technologies and Capgemini did not immediately respond to a request for . Vance’s announcement comes on the same day President Donald Trump is expected to award Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella with the National Medal of Technology and Innovation during a White House summit on “Science: A New Golden Age.” This article originally appeared on Politico at