It’s about time. We all know that immigration attorneys are making huge bucks processing guest worker Visas and working every loophole for businesses. 
Why on Google ads, which places automatically content appropriate ads onto your blog, I have banned hundreds of immigration law firm advertisers peddling their wares on how to not hire an American. Obviously corporations are more than willing to pay huge attorney fees to skirt the law instead of using that money to hire entire divisions of American engineers. Well, finally, the DOL is actually auditing one of these firms.
From the Department of Labor press release:
The U.S. Department of Labor today announced that it has begun auditing all permanent labor certification applications filed by attorneys at Fragomen, Del Rey, Bernsen & Loewy LLP. The department has information indicating that in at least some cases the firm improperly instructed clients who filed permanent labor certification applications to contact their attorney before hiring apparently qualified U.S. workers. The audits will determine which, if any, applications should be denied or placed into department-supervised recruitment because of improper attorney involvement in the consideration of U.S. worker applicants
Additionally the DOL said, “The department’s regulations specifically prohibit an employer’s immigration attorney or agent from participating in considering the qualifications of U.S. workers who apply for positions for which certification is sought, unless the attorney is normally involved in the employer’s routine hiring process“.
Notice that the Cohen & Grigsby immigration law firm stated:
Our goal is clearly NOT TO FIND a qualified and interested U.S. worker
Immigration attorneys assist corporations to legally not hire U.S. workers routinely. Their law practice is standard practice and for the most part it’s perfectly legal. This is why corporate lobbyists (often immigration attorneys), oppose reforms such as S.1035, which would stop some of the legal loopholes to discriminate against US workers legally. Immigration law firms bank on those loopholes and are assuredly one cog in the global labor arbitrage wheel making huge bucks at the detriment and expensive of the people doing the real work.
Network News story coverage:
If only lawyers would be subject to worker displacement via guest worker Visas. I think only then would they stop this Benedict Arnold slave trade business they are so intent on expanding.
Great reporting!
This is absolutely the crux of the problem - immigration attorneys exploiting the loopholes in the h1B & PERM system and lobbying to continuously increase their client base. It’s a perfect storm of aligned interests - Foreigners desperate for US residency, Attorneys getting rich off them and politicians who don’t care - all arrayed against ordinary Americans.