Copyright The New York Times
Gov. Ron DeSantis directed Florida education officials to “pull the plug” on the use of H-1B visas for foreign workers at the state’s universities, arguing that such jobs should go to Americans. At a news conference at the University of South Florida in Tampa on Wednesday, Mr. DeSantis rattled off a list of jobs at the state’s colleges that he said should be filled by Americans: public policy professor from China, graphic designer from Canada, assistant swim coach from Spain. “Are you kidding me?” he said. “We can’t produce an assistant swim coach in this country?” The details of the plan were not immediately clear, including whether it would apply to current visa holders, or for future applications. H-1B visas are provided to educated foreign citizens applying to work in specialty occupations. The governor’s office did not respond to requests for comment on Wednesday. The Florida Board of Governors, which oversees the state’s public universities, also did not immediately respond to a message. About 400 H-1B visa applications were approved for the state system’s 12 universities this year through June, with the most, 156, at the University of Florida, according to Department of Homeland Security data. The governor’s comments are in line with the agenda of the Trump administration, which last month enacted a $100,000 fee for new H-1B visas. If Florida’s university system embraces Mr. DeSantis’s proposal, it will be at odds with many higher education leaders, who have spent recent weeks publicly and privately lobbying the White House and Congress against Mr. Trump’s proclamation. They have argued that H-1B visa holders fill critical teaching and research roles. “Limiting H-1B visas in Florida would threaten the public purpose of higher education in the state by undermining the ability to recruit and retain top international faculty, researchers and students,” said Lynn Pasquerella, president of the American Association of Colleges and Universities. She said that the Florida board does not have the authority to revoke or eliminate H-1B visas, since they are regulated by the federal government. But, she added, state boards can make policy changes to reduce or stop sponsoring such visas, a move that would most likely result in court challenges. The Trump order is already the subject of litigation. In a court filing last week, Barbara R. Snyder, the president of the Association of American Universities, a trade group, warned that the proposal’s “harms are being felt already.” Plans to sponsor workers, she said, were being put “on hold, perhaps indefinitely.” Administrators at public and private universities gave similarly dire warnings in their own submissions to the Federal District Court in Washington. Washington University in St. Louis, which has a significant scientific research arm and vast health care operations, said more than 700 of its workers hold H-1B visas and “make vital contributions to WashU’s teaching and scholarship and our ability to conduct cutting-edge research, make scientific discoveries, and care for patients.” In the wake of Mr. Trump’s order, leaders at the school said, the university had both stopped submitting H-1B applications and recruiting experts from abroad to fill medical jobs. In a separate filing, Charles L. Isbell Jr., the chancellor of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, said the visa holders “play a critical role in research, teaching, and service at the University of Illinois.”
