Many industries are in crisis because of the lack of US visas in the temporary worker program, together with the high level of demand in 2018, even in counties and states where President Donald Trump promised to support small businesses.
The Trump administration changed the H-2B US visa program from the ‘first come, first served’ model to a lottery system, making it more difficult for companies wanting to access temporary workers from overseas. The guest-worker program was created by Congress, which has limited the number of available visas to 66,000, dividing them between winter and summer seasons and rebuffing calls to have the cap either permanently raised or eliminated.
But, Congress allowed the Department of Homeland Security to create extra temporary US visas to be available in 2018, marking the third consecutive year that this has happened. The Trump administration released a further 15,000 US visas in May, due to the extra demand for H-2B workers. But business owners and industry organizations say it is still not enough and that the system needs an overhaul.
US Citizenship and Immigration Services spokesman, Michael Bars, said the agency is set on overhauling the program but also wishes to protect the interests of American workers. Business owners and industry figures, though, indicate that the Trump administration immigration policies may be hurting rather than helping those the President wanted to protect.