Sen. J. D. Vance (R-OH) is launching an investigation into President Joe Biden’s Department of Justice ( DOJ) over what he claims is unfair treatment of foreigners in cases of employment discrimination.
In a letter to Judge leaders, Vance, Sen. Mike Lee ( R- UT), and Sen. Tommy Tuberville ( R- AL ) suggest that the office has become increasingly light- focused on work discrimination cases where international employees are the alleged victims.
Since Biden took office in late January 2021, cases where Americans are the alleged victims of employment discrimination have decreased significantly.
We ask that the DOJ faithfully discharges its legal responsibilities in protecting American workers from discrimination against asylum seekers, parolees, and other aliens over American citizens. The Civil Rights Division is nowhere to be found, the senators wrote, despite recent reports suggesting that these practices are becoming more prevalent.
As you know, U. S. citizens are “protected individuals” against whom employers cannot discriminate under the Immigration and Nationality Act ( INA ). In fact, they are more than protected—they are preferred. If both are fully qualified for the position, it is not an unfair immigration-related employment practice for a person or other entity to hire, recruit, or refer an individual who is a citizen or national of the United States to another person who is an alien, according to the INA. Thus, federal law instructs employers to put a thumb on the balance in favor of American workers: as one federal appellate court once argued, “you take the U.S. citizen and a foreigner with exactly the same qualifications.” citizen”. ]Emphasis added]
Thus, one would anticipate that the authorities charged with enforcing the INA’s prohibition on citizenship discrimination to be at least as concerned with victims of U.S. citizenship as they are with aliens. However, if that is the case, recent events have obscured its true meaning. ]Emphasis added]
In particular, the senators noted that the DOJ’s , Immigrant and Employee Rights Section ( IER ) published 46 press releases in the last two years regarding enforcement of the INA’s anti- discrimination provisions.
Less than 2 out of 10 of those press releases involved discrimination against Americans for work, and only 2 of those included discrimination against Americans for work.
” It would seem, then, that a disproportionate share of IER’s resources have been deployed to protect precisely those workers that federal law disfavors, all else being equal”, the senators wrote.
When Biden abruptly terminated the” Buy American, Hire American” executive order in 2021, the Protecting U.S. Workers Initiative was launched by former US President Donald Trump’s DOJ, which aimed specifically at employers favoring foreigners over Americans.
The senators claimed that as a result, employers are swindling them.
” Employers have taken advantage of IER’s leniency”, the senators wrote:
A long list of American employers have begun blatant discrimination on the basis of citizenship and immigration status in collaboration with advocacy groups like the Tent Partnership for Refugees, some of whom have even pledged to comply with numerical hiring quotas. Starbucks has committed to hiring 10, 000 refugees across all its markets ( including the U. S. market ), Amazon has committed to hiring 5, 000 refugees in the United States alone, and numerous others—including Hyatt Hotels, PepsiCo, and Pfizer—have committed to hiring 500 refugees or more. The INA prohibits hiring decisions that are made “because of” an American job seeker’s U. S. citizenship. Can employers ‘ numerical hiring quotas coexist with that requirement? ]Emphasis added]
Some companies, like Tyson Foods, even provide employment benefits exclusively to noncitizens. Tyson has spent significant amounts “reimbursing ] team members for citizenship application fees” and retaining organizations that “provide immigrants with legal services, such as employment authorization renewals and petitions for citizenship,” in addition to “reimbursing ] team members for citizenship application fees.” In theory, these benefits may be open to all- comers. How many Americans, however, are required to pay citizenship application fees by their employers? ]Emphasis added]
By May 31 the senators will request records from the DOJ asking them to verify whether the agency is currently looking into hiring refugees instead of Americans.
The senators also want answers on the proportion of investigations, settlements, and litigation involving only American citizens over the past two years, as well as whether the department believes it is permissible to offer employment benefits to only foreign workers.
Vance has long raised the alarm about the Biden administration’s alleged bias toward foreigners over American citizens.
In August of last year, Breitbart News exclusively detailed Vance’s efforts to bring transparency , regarding the DOJ’s lawsuit against SpaceX— which accuses Elon Musk’s rocket company of failing to “fairly consider or hire asylees and refugees”.
The following month, SpaceX countersued the DOJ to throw out the lawsuit.
For Breitbart News, John Binder is a reporter. Email him at , [email protected].  , Follow him on Twitter , here.
