Hartford Business Journal

www.HartfordBusiness.com • June 10, 2019 • Hartford Business Journal 17 require companies to further justify the need for a foreign worker as op- posed to hiring a U.S. national. She's not alone. In the final three months of last year, 60 percent of completed H-1B cases across the coun- try had requests for evidence, which delays the final visa approval process and can tack on costly fees for more legal and other work. "The amount of effort it takes to re- spond to an RFE is enormous," Bucin said. Bucin said it's also been frustrating because USCIS seems to be targeting the types of jobs that it never batted an eye at in the past — highly skilled engineering, medical and law occupa- tions that she said the H-1B program exists to fill. "It's very disconcerting," she said. Bucin said the apparent heightened scrutiny belies the fact that the law and regulations that govern how US- CIS is supposed to review H-1B applications have not changed. Attorneys for H-1B employer petitioners have sued the fed- eral agency over denials, alleging it has unilater- ally changed the rules, while USCIS insists it's not doing anything different, Forbes recently reported. While some say President Trump's rhetoric about "America first" and blaming illegal immigration for a loss of manufacturing jobs has ginned up anti- immigrant sentiment, Bucin is careful not to be overly critical or political. But she said in general, she has no patience for anti-immigration stances. One allegation she's heard plenty of in her line of work is that companies want H-1B visas so they can replace U.S. workers with cheaper labor. Bucin said federal law requires an employer that's hiring a foreign worker to pay the prevailing wage for that position, as certified by the U.S. Department of Labor. The fact that a company is willing to pay that wage ($95,482 in Connecticut last year), plus thousands of dollars more for a lawyer, immigration fees and responding to RFEs, proves her point, she said. "It's not about the cheap labor," she said. "What sane employer would pay a $7,000 premium to get a foreigner if they could just have an American?" "They just want talent … and they want [skilled foreign workers] because they can't find them in the general population," she added. Mark Soycher, human resource counsel for the Connecticut Business & Industry Association, agrees. CBIA's member companies want access to more talent, whether it's an international student graduating from a local university with an advanced de- gree, or a skilled worker coming here from abroad for the first time. "I would say generally what I'm hearing from employers is that they're struggling to find qualified workers," Soycher said. He said higher visa denial rates are likely to discourage some employers from pursuing foreign workers, even though that may be a mistake on their part. "It may be a very worthwhile invest- ment," he said of the added time and expense of pursuing an H-1B. Matt McCooe, CEO of Connecticut Innovations, says more immigration could boost the state's economy over time. Worker visa denial rates spike in CT and across U.S. Amidst higher application volumes, immigration officials are also denying a greater number of initial H-1B visa applications. *2019 data covers only the first quarter of the federal fiscal year (Oct.-Dec. 2018) USCIS approval and denial data only reflect the agency's first decision on an application. If it later changes its mind through an appeals process the data does not reflect it. Source: USCIS 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 0 10 20 30 40 Initial denial rate % CT USA 2.5% 8% 4.2% 7% 3% 5% 4.4% 6.8% 4.1% 7.5% 4.4% 6.4% 6.2% 9.7% 7.2% 13.1% 17.8% 24.3% 25.2% 31.5% 2.5% 8% 4.2% 7% 3% 5% 4.4% 6.8% 4.1% 7.5% 4.4% 6.4% 6.2% 9.7% 7.2% 13.1% 17.8% 24.3% 25.2% 31.5% PHOTO | HBJ FILE www.cocommunications.com Goldfish have longer attention spans than humans.

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