California [US],  October 9 (ANI): California Governor Gavin Newsom has criticised US President Donald Trump's immigration policies, accusing his administration of undermining the American economy by restricting legal immigration, as the US government suspends major technology companies from the Permanent Labour Certification Program.

In a post on X on Thursday (local time), the Governor Newsom Press Office quoted Newsom as saying, 'You don't make America stronger by shutting the door on talent. You invest in American workers and attract the world's best and brightest.'

https://x.com/GovPressOffice/status/2108340413207626029

'Donald Trump is taking a sledgehammer to legal immigration and undermining our economy -- all to distract from his own failures,' the post added.

Newsom's remarks come amid continued criticism of the administration's move to suspend major technology companies from the Permanent Labour Certification Program, which provides a pathway towards employment-based green cards for eligible foreign workers.

US Vice President JD Vance has defended the administration's position. On Thursday (local time), responding to Democratic Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal, Vance said, ''Socialism' apparently means fighting like hell to ensure mega-corporations have a never-ending flow of cheap labour.'

Jayapal, who sits on the House Immigration Subcommittee and previously held an H-1B visa, said the administration's actions weakened legal immigration and America's ability to innovate.

In a post on X, she said, 'This is a crucial issue for me as the top Democrat on the Immigration Subcommittee, the only member of Congress to have actually had an H-1B visa, and the Representative for tens of thousands of Microsoft workers. The administration has been consistently working to take away legal pathways for immigrants to contribute their talents to our country, and this is yet another of those attacks. The PERM program is the first step toward an employment-based green card for countless workers who want to contribute to this country, and it lays out a clear process with steps to ensure that this is a net benefit to our economy and does not harm American jobs.'

'Our economy, our communities, and our families depend on immigrants in many sectors, including the tech sector, and heavy-handed attacks like this only hurt efforts to build a strong, stable, and diverse base of workers who have legal pathways to come and be in the United States while also protecting U.S. workers from unscrupulous employers. You don't fix a broken immigration system by taking a hammer to legal immigration. Microsoft has been a leader in advocating for comprehensive immigration reforms that modernize an antiquated immigration system and provide more - not fewer - legal pathways for immigrants from all over the world to work here and be with their families. Targeting Microsoft or the PERM program in this way simply undermines legal immigration and weakens America's ability to innovate,' she further said.

Earlier, while addressing a news conference on visa fraud, Vance described workers arriving in the United States on H-1B visas as 'indentured servants'.

'If you are working as an H-1B visa in the United States of America, you're earning $20,000 less than an American citizen hired in the same position. If you were brought in by one of these foreign outsourcing firms, you're making $48,000 less than an American citizen in a similar position. So, I'm sure that everybody here understands the game that is being played. You bring in indentured servants from outside the country, you lay off American workers and, if you're a corporation, you make a ton of money by under cutting the wages of American workers, replacing them with people who frankly shouldn't be in the United States of America to begin with.'

In a major policy move, US Labour Secretary Keith Sonderling announced that the government was suspending some of the world's largest IT outsourcing firms from the Permanent Labour Certification Program. The companies named included Cognizant, Infosys, Tata, Wipro, HCL and Capgemini. The Labour Department attributed the suspensions to multiple active federal investigations and also suspended US technology majors Microsoft and Adobe from the program.

Sonderling said the companies had collectively sought millions of foreign workers and received hundreds of thousands of H-1B visa approvals and permanent labour certifications.

'Since 2009, just these companies alone have requested almost 3 million foreign workers. They received over 230,000 H1B Visa approvals and over 100,000 permanent labour certifications that's hundred and thousands of jobs that were taken from a American workers,' the Labour Secretary said.

The announcement came a day after the US Department of Homeland Security proposed new fees for F-1 non-immigrant students seeking to participate in Optional Practical Training (OPT). The department described the proposed measure as an effort to protect American workers and strengthen the integrity of the immigration system. (ANI)