Lori Chavez-DeRemer / X/@LChavezDeRemer

Washington, Feb. 20: The Trump Administration would look for foreign guest workers on H-1B in high-tech and specialty sectors only after they have exhausted all other programs, former Congresswoman Lori Chavez-DeRemer, who is the nominee to lead the Department of Labor told, lawmakers on Wednesday.

“Once we’ve exhausted all other programs and making sure that we’re out there, then work with the Department of Homeland (Security) and certainly the Department of State and if we have to administer more. … Congress will determine it, and then I’ll work with those inner agencies as well,” Chavez-DeRemer told members of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee during her confirmation hearing.

She was responding to a question from Republican Senator Tommy Tuberville from Alabama, according to him there is shortage of qualified engineers in the big tech sector. H-1B is a foreign work visa for highly skilled professionals. High-tech IT professionals from India have benefited the most from this.

“We’re running short on a lot of engineers, high tech people that are well trained in our country. For some reason, we’re running short because Big Tech is growing. Where do you stand on legal immigration? Your thoughts?” the Senator asked.

“Well, I’m supportive of legal immigration only. I mean, I don’t see another way around it. […] Are you referring to the H-1B Visa program?” the former Congresswoman said.

“Yeah. Anything to do with high-tech. Anything to do with engineers that eventually, we’re going to have to allow more people to come [into the country]. But not to tear down the structure of young men and women having a chance to make a better living because they spent four or five years at a university and have to pay their bills,” the Senator said.

“Certainly, we never want to replace the American worker. We want to make sure that we’re investing in the American worker, and they have the skills needed for the high-tech industry as we see moving forward through a lot of our respective states,” Chavez-DeRemer said.

“On the visitor’s Visa, on the H-1B, there’s been conversation about in the immediacy, I’ve heard that from many of the senators—it’s about today. What happens today and tomorrow? I commit to you to working, again, with testing the market. That’s the Department of Labor’s remit. It’s to test the market and see where we need the guest worker program,” she said.

In her opening remarks, the Labor Secretary nominee said if confirmed, her job would be to implement President Trump’s policy vision, and her guiding principle will be President Trump’s guiding principle: ensuring a level playing field for businesses, unions, and most importantly, the American worker.

Lori Chavez-Deremer said President Donald Trump has been very public about protecting the American worker and understands that they don't want to displace American workers.

“I understand some of the Senators in the guest visa program on the immediacy of certain industries. But as a whole, we want to make sure that we're always investing in the American worker first, that we want to be one of the strongest economies in the Union and in the world,” she said.

“We're talking about China. But what's important to the President and important to me and how we align is making sure that we're putting the American worker first and that they have the opportunities to earn and be at those jobs as they see fit,” she argued.

During the confirmation hearing, Senator Josh Hawley said during the previous Biden Administration, 520,000 unaccompanied children were trafficked across the border, hundreds of thousands of them lost and now being exploited by companies like Tyson's Food, for example.

“Let me just give you an example of bad corporate behavior. Tyson's Food has closed down two major plants in my state, the state of Missouri just in the last year and a half. They have canceled contracts with farmers. They have put thousands of workers in my state out of business and yet we know from the investigations done by the New York Times and others that they have huge numbers of illegal child labor in their supply chains in their factories,” he alleged.

“They are putting children who are trafficked here to work, so they're firing American workers, but they are exploiting child workers. Will you go after companies like Tyson's and anyone else who would violate our labor laws and exploit children while they are firing American workers,” Hawley asked.

The Department of Labor has the enforcement capability to double down if they knowingly are breaking the law and exploiting children in their factories, Lori Chavez-Deremer said.