PRESS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 01, 2021
Contact:
Vikram Desai
(202) 386-6250
press@ImmigrationVoice.org
Immigration Voice Announces Support from Bipartisan Legislators for Introduction of Legislation Seeking Equal Access to Employment-based Green Cards for People from All Countries alongside Increased Incentives for Companies to Hire U.S. Workers; launches EAGLEAct.info to educate the public about the bill.
June 1, 2021 (Washington, DC) — Immigration Voice, a national non-profit organization that advocates for the alleviation of restrictions on employment, travel, and working conditions faced by more than 1.2 million legal high-skilled immigrants in the United States is proud to announce the bipartisan introduction of the Equal Access to Greencards for Legal Employment (EAGLE) Act of 2021.
The EAGLE Act is one of the first bipartisan immigration bills that members of the House have introduced this year. It is an improved version of the Fairness for High Skilled Immigrants Act (H.R. 1044; 116th Congress), which was a very popular bill that had 311 bipartisan co-sponsors and passed the House by a 365-65 vote on July 10, 2019.
The EAGLE Act maintains the most important and most popular provision, that of creating a fair and equitable, “first come, first served” system for receiving employment-based Green Cards. This ends the discriminatory quota system based on country of birth, which has pushed over 1 million Indian high-skilled immigrant workers in the United States into a 200-year wait for Green Cards while individuals from other countries face no wait time at all, simply due to their country of birth. Additionally, changes were also made to strengthen the bill to encourage the hiring of American workers and to ensure that people from all countries retain fair access to employment based Green Cards.
The lead sponsors of this bill in the House are Rep. Zoe Lofgren and Rep. John Curtis. Last Congress, the bill had 311 bipartisan cosponsors in the House and over 35 bipartisan cosponsors in the Senate. The bill passed by Unanimous Consent in the Senate on December 2, 2020 (meaning all 100 Senators from both parties agreed to pass the bill). Unfortunately, time ran out before the House and the Senate could reconcile their drafts but this Congress provides ample opportunity to pass a bipartisan bill.
Immigration Voice is also proud to launch the website EAGLEact.info to raise awareness about the bill and educate the public about the benefits of the EAGLE Act for high-skilled immigrants and American Workers.
Aman Kapoor, the Co-Founder and President of Immigration Voice stated that:
“The EAGLE Act is a win-win for the American people. Every member of Congress now agrees that it is morally and legally indefensible to have a discriminatory per-country based allocation system for employment-based Green Cards that bans talented Indian immigrants from receiving Green Cards during their lifetime if they apply today. This bill transitions the allocation of employment-based Green Cards to a first-come, first-served application while also safeguarding the concerns of foreign nationals from countries that were accustomed to special treatment and having no wait time at all to receive Green Cards due to discriminatory per country limits. In addition to achieving an equal and more merit-based system, the bill ensures that in exchange for changing the Green Card system to become fair for all international applicants, American workers are prioritized for hiring by all U.S. companies such that no foreign worker can be used to undercut an American worker for a U.S. job. This bill benefits only one country in the world – The United States of America.
We are incredibly grateful to Representatives Lofgren and Curtis, and all of our original co-sponsors, for their leadership and are confident that this will be the year the bill will pass.
For more information about the Eagle Act, please visit eagleact.info
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Immigration Voice, a national non-profit organization representing more than 1.2 million tax-paying law-abiding high-skilled immigrants, advocates for the alleviation of restrictions on employment, travel, and working conditions faced by legal high-skilled immigrants in the United States who work as doctors, researchers, scientists, engineers, and other high-skilled professionals at many American hospitals, universities and Fortune 500 companies. For more information, visit immigrationvoice.org
