Good morning. It’s Tuesday. Today we’ll take a closer look at a visa program that was supposed to foster cultural exchanges but has sometimes become a pipeline for cheap labor. We’ll also find out what happened to the last casino proposal still under consideration for Manhattan.
Thousands of young people from around the world travel to the U.S. on J-1 visas every year, expecting advanced training in fields that interest them and time off to visit famous places. But a New York Times investigation found that some companies had used the visa program as a source of cheap labor, hiring people with J-1 visas as farmworkers, housekeepers and office interns. I asked my colleague Amy Julia Harris, who interviewed more than 40 visa workers and reviewed court filings and regulatory documents, to talk about the J-1 program.
About 300,000 people enter the U.S. under the J-1 visa exchange program each year. The Trump administration is cracking down on immigration, but it has taken a hands-off approach to the J-1 program. Why?
The J-1 visa is supposed to be a cultural exchange program, not a work program. But during President Trump’s first term, he did propose doing away with parts of the J-1 visa, saying that the program stole jobs from American workers.
This term, the J-1 visa has not been a big priority for the Trump administration. A lobbying group for the cultural exchange industry says that the program fits with Trump’s domestic agenda because it costs taxpayers nothing (it is funded by fees from the foreign workers) and because it is not an immigration program since workers stay for only a set period of time.
Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.
Thank you for your patience while we verify access.
Already a subscriber? Log in.
Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
The post The Dark Side of a Cultural Exchange Program appeared first on New York Times.
