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Microsoft has urged its employees on H-1B and H-4 visas to return immediately

timesofindia.indiatimes.com

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Re: Microsoft has urged its employees on H-1B and H-4 visas to return immediately

#431

Post by fabianholzer »

tempodox wrote: post #244

https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/09/rest... : > … the effective date of this proclamation, which shall be 12:01 a.m. eastern daylight time on September 21, 2025. That doesn’t leave much time. I would have expected that current visa holders wouldn’t fall under this rule. Shouldn’t it be a legal standard not to apply new rules retroactively?

> Shouldn’t it be a legal standard not to apply new rules retroactively?

It should. But the in the American empire you better pray they don't alter the deal any further.

Re: Microsoft has urged its employees on H-1B and H-4 visas to return immediately

#432

Post by habinero »

ericmay wrote: post #379
intended wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The capriciousness, lack of concern with reality, the poor implementation…

Eh I think that’s a general feature of governments, not necessarily something unique to the Trump administration.

This sure didn't happen under Biden.

Re: Microsoft has urged its employees on H-1B and H-4 visas to return immediately

#433

Post by ecocentrik »

mlsu wrote: post #390

The argument is “well why don’t they come legally” … “if they just followed the law” … And this is what they are doing to those people, who followed all the rules, did everything right. That tells you everything you need to know about the intentions of this admin.

They ran out of illegal immigrants with prior criminal records almost immediately and their political strategy depends on the generation of new "others" to demonize. MAGA basically hates everyone, including themselves, so they will keep expanding their targets.

Re: Microsoft has urged its employees on H-1B and H-4 visas to return immediately

#434

Post by hvb2 »

timr wrote: post #355
Scoundreller wrote: post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> or stating that pre-existing visa holders are subject to the new rules How are you interpreting "on entry"?

In the plain text manner. To me the more relevant portion is this: > ...except for those aliens whose petitions are accompanied or supplemented by a payment of $100,000 Again, just doing a plain text reading, this seems to be intended to apply to new applicants, but they didn't explicitly spell it out. It's the sort of thing that would be debated endlessly in the rounds of legal review that accompany a...more traditi…

I read it as, it either was accompanied by a payment already or it has to be supplemented

Where the supplement would obviously be for the existing ones

Re: Microsoft has urged its employees on H-1B and H-4 visas to return immediately

#435

Post by gimmeThaBeet »

pimlottc wrote: post #320
mrmansano wrote: post #140

Anecdotally, although I'm sure it's happening to more people. I'm Brazilian, I work in the US on H1-B. I'm on vacations in Brazil with my wife and kids, one in school age. I also came to renew my visa stamp, as I had my extension approved not long ago. My visa is valid from September 21st, so, same day as this proclamation takes effect. And I can't go back before that because my visa is not valid. My flight was sched…

Wow. "On vacation" makes it sounds like workers were just off "having fun" (which of course is their right), but as your story illustrates, many immigrants are required to leave the US for their visa renewals. To be forced to leave the country and then be barred from return by an sudden change in the rules is the most unjust cruelty. As an American, I'm deeply ashamed by this. I hope you and your family are able to r…

This is what sticks with me the deepest.

With immigration are unquestionably tough decisions, tradeoffs, philosophies on the issue, and demographics in general. It gets heated, fast. I know I'm biased, but I wish trust had not degraded to such an extent you could believe people could deal with these topics in good faith.

But how can anyone support this kind of craven policymaking where uncertainty and cruelty are features and not bugs? Just shock and awe and deafening silence.

That's what's so dishearterning. Is that who we are now, or is this just a timely excuse to be who we always have?

Re: Microsoft has urged its employees on H-1B and H-4 visas to return immediately

#436

Post by eloisant »

yibg wrote: post #353
Scoundreller wrote: post #339

Oh great, some of our vendors work in USA on H1bs and when they need to send someone on-site to us (in Canada), they send the Canadian. I guess we'll be seeing someone new and unfamiliar... (edit: the vendor workers might be in USA on TN status and might be okay for now, I haven't asked)

Yea that's an interesting dimension too. If this holds as is, then business travel for H1B holders is dead.

No business travel is one thing, no vacation to see your family in your home country is something else entirely.

I guess they really do want foreigners to move out of the US.

Re: Microsoft has urged its employees on H-1B and H-4 visas to return immediately

#437

Post by cjbgkagh »

cjbgkagh wrote: post #129
Ar-Curunir wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m sorry, but what? What part of your statement is relevant to the rapid and cruel enactment of the policy? Leaving aside whether or not it is unreasonable, the immediate applicability, over a weekend , of this policy, is that this thread is discussing. Not your smug satisfaction at the validity of the policy.

Point 1 H-1B is a horrible program that has to go, the manner in which this is done is unfortunate. Like many things it should have been done nicer and sooner but apparently that wasn’t an option. Point 2 I’m certain exemptions will be granted that will mean in reality the H-1B gets to continue being a horrible problem for everyday Americans and the software industry in general. I don’t want to work in a lemon market…

Seems like the first exemption was all current visa holders so all that panic was over nothing.

Re: Microsoft has urged its employees on H-1B and H-4 visas to return immediately

#438

Post by dotnet00 »

yibg wrote: post #328
yash1th wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i did not know until today there is this much anti-immigrant and especially anti-indian sentiment in tech. idk, it was very eye opening and very sad to read those. i am telling myself that people who were posting those things are small in numbers.

It's not surprising really. There needs to be an enemy group, one that some portion of the supporting population has some grievance against. First it's hispanics (illegal immigrants taking your jobs), then trans (men in womens washrooms), then Indians (taking your tech jobs), then it'll be some other group.

There are also the Chinese (stealing your technology).

Re: Microsoft has urged its employees on H-1B and H-4 visas to return immediately

#439

Post by timr »

JuniperMesos wrote: post #373
onlyrealcuzzo wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of Europe, Central and South America, Canada, Australia, Japan, India, South Korea - the majority of the world that could not already be described as authoritarian

People describe all of these countries as authoritarian for various reasons. Multiple Indian immigrants I have worked with in the US have expressed displeasure at authoritarianism in India today, which I find difficult to distinguish from just not liking Modi.

Few people actually know what "authoritarian" means, and are mostly just repeating things they've heard and intend to mean as "leaders doing things I don't personally like."

A strict definition of "authoritarian" [1] doesn't fit the current US administration at all in many ways, since they've focused their attention on tearing down government, not building it up. In some ways they demand stricter enforcement of (pre-existing!) rules, but in many others they have acted to undermine government authority (e.g. with respect to environmental regulations). Generally the people who decry authoritarianism in the domain of immigration enforcement will turn around and decry loosening of regulations about things that they prefer to be regulated by the government.

[1] "favoring or enforcing strict obedience to authority, especially that of the government, at the expense of personal freedom." per Google's definition.

Re: Microsoft has urged its employees on H-1B and H-4 visas to return immediately

#440

Post by w10-1 »

Regardless of the merits of such visas, they were legal, and companies now depend on them.

Business uncertainty is off the charts when any administration can change existing policy at a whim and on short notice, for any kind of sunk costs.

The whim makes it uncertain, the short notice makes it unmanageable, and the sunk-cost makes it unavoidable.

It's this uncertainty that fuels government corruption, by creating an undifferentiated need to make nice and comply.

At each step, it will be cheaper for companies to join than to resist, and companies that resist will get oversized responses as a warning to others. That makes joining corruption an economic necessity.

This is how Putin organized and subjugated Russian oligarchs and the elites.

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