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America’s Brain Drain: H-1B Lottery Chaos (Full) · Solving America's Problems

0:05
Alex: Solving America’s Problems — where Jerremy and Dave just learned
0:07
that a Stanford PhD who’s spent seven years in the US, paid taxes,
0:11
and is literally curing cancer… has the exact same 25% lottery shot at
0:17
staying here as any random bachelor’s degree holder filing from overseas.
0:23
Melissa Harms laid it out cold: every spring, USCIS runs a literal
0:27
random drawing for 85,000 H1B visas.
0:31
Last year 358,000 people registered.
0:34
This year it dropped, but still triple the cap.
0:37
One of her clients — a biotech star — lost the lottery nine straight times.
0:42
Another got selected, then laid off before the paperwork even
0:45
landed because the economy turned.
0:48
And when the best minds finally give up?
0:51
They don’t go home.
0:52
They open the same lab in Hong Kong or Toronto — and hire everyone there instead.
0:58
Jerremy and Dave sat there stunned as Melissa said the quiet part
1:01
out loud: America is now actively shipping its own brain drain overseas…
1:07
Jerremy Newsome: The people want to know Conley.
1:11
What are we talking about today?
1:12
Dave Conley: In this week's episode of Solving America's Problems, we examine
1:15
the outdated structures crippling our immigration system, where businesses and
1:19
universities invest billions, training and educating cutting edge global talent
1:23
only to face an immigration system so old it forces Silicon Valley to mail paper
1:27
applications like its 1925, not 2025.
1:31
At the heart of these issues are politicians unable or unwilling to
1:34
change laws in 40 years, companies desperately trying to hire Stanford PhD,
1:38
curing cancer have the same 25% chance as anyone else, and your best sales
1:43
person from Canada, or entrepreneur from Europe, starting the next great company.
1:47
Have no chance at all.
1:48
Our guest, Melissa Harms brings 25 years of experience as an attorney on
1:52
the front lines of immigration law.
1:53
She helps fortune five hundreds, startups, universities, and biotech
1:57
labs navigate the broken bureaucracy and inefficient government systems
2:01
driving America's innovation overseas.
2:03
She's taught immigration courses at Cal State and the University of California,
2:07
and speaks nationally for the American Immigration Lawyers Association on
2:11
navigating visa challenges to retain top talent and drive economic growth.
2:15
And that's this week on solving America's problems, paper planes, and brain drain.
2:19
America's talent crisis with Melissa harms.
2:22
Jerremy Newsome: Every year, America educates the world's brightest minds.
2:27
Then we kick them out.
2:29
International students pump 44 billion into our economy, but we hand them
2:34
diplomas with deportation notices.
2:37
Meanwhile, companies from Silicon Valley to Main Street follow every rule,
2:40
pay every fee, but still can't fill all the jobs they desperately need.
2:44
What's the result?
2:46
Cities from Beijing to Berlin are thinking us for the best talent in the world.
2:51
I'm Jerremy Alexander Newsom with my co-host Dave Conley, and this
2:55
is solving America's Problems.
2:58
Today we have Melissa Harms 25 years as an immigration attorney on the front lines.
3:05
the one CEOs call when the Visa system threatens their best people
3:10
Silicon Valley to University Labs.
3:13
She knows exactly where this thing is broken, and we're
3:15
gonna be discussing that.
3:16
Melissa, welcome to the show.
3:20
Melissa Harms: Thanks, Jerremy.
3:21
I'm not sure I can say exactly where it's broken.
3:23
It's broken in many places.
3:24
I don't have, if I had the recipe to fix this, I'd be making a lot more money
3:28
than I am right now, that's for sure.
3:30
Jerremy Newsome: You at least know all the things that are broken, or
3:32
Melissa Harms: I can, yes, I can tell you it's broken.
3:35
Maybe not how to fix it.
3:36
Jerremy Newsome: That's okay.
3:37
That, the good news is we're gonna have a conversation.
3:38
We get to use your ideas and your thoughts and your beliefs, and
3:43
Dave's whimsical concepts of how to change and make adaptations.
3:47
That's why we're here.
3:48
Lemme throw this at you, 25 years Melissa, helping businesses and
3:53
universities navigate immigration.
3:55
Did you know in law school that you wanted to do employment and immigration law?
4:00
Melissa Harms: Yes and no.
4:01
I did initially start out in employment law really thinking I wanted to
4:06
get into employment discrimination.
4:08
I've always been interested in women's issues.
4:10
I was a public policy major in college but not so much immigration, although I
4:15
loved travel and international cultures.
4:17
I hadn't really been thought about immigration and quite honestly fell
4:21
into it after doing the big firm route for a little while and realizing
4:25
that's not where my heart was.
4:26
Really wanting to pursue a field of law where I felt like
4:29
I could enact social change.
4:32
While also using my analytical skills and law degree.
4:34
And so that's how I sort of happenstance into immigration a few years
4:38
after graduation from law school.
4:41
Jerremy Newsome: And just as like a brief.
4:42
I dunno, maybe this might be more for me.
4:45
the heck is immigration law?
4:47
What are you doing?
4:48
Are you changing the policies?
4:49
Are you working with individuals?
4:52
Melissa Harms: That's a really good question.
4:53
We have a fair share of policy.
4:54
Like we like to call them policy walks that are working for the
4:58
national, on the national level.
5:00
Doing lobbying and telling, coming up with what the fair systems are.
5:04
We have a national group called American Immigration Lawyers Association, which
5:07
is about 15,000 immigration lawyers nationwide and they're really in
5:11
charge of doing a lot of the lobbying work disseminating information.
5:14
I've been involved with them on many levels.
5:17
Recently working with them on technology.
5:19
And we worked with USAS on technology for immigration which was great, but
5:24
ultimately after the administration change led to a whole lot of nothing,
5:27
which is a theme that we might continue throughout our conversation.
5:30
But in the actual practice of immigration law, we really have two different sectors.
5:35
We have those who help with deportation removal, so those are the people who
5:40
are on the front lines of the border who are working with undocumented workers.
5:44
Trying to figure out some sort of relief for them once they're in that
5:47
pod of being unauthorized coming here illegally or falling out of status.
5:51
And then we also have the other pot of immigration lawyers, which are
5:55
the business immigration attorneys.
5:57
And that's where I fall.
5:58
We're the ones that work with corporations and companies and universities to
6:02
obtain visas for people who are here now legally, or maybe people who are
6:06
outside the US who we wanna bring over.
6:08
But we generally don't touch the pool of, that's almost like a whole
6:12
nother field of law working in the deportation aspect of things.
6:17
Jerremy Newsome: But still really fascinating because after, don't
6:20
know, probably 12 conversations on this topic, it would also seem that
6:24
I think the majority of listeners, the majority of participants, they
6:27
feel like the biggest immigration, at least the largest challenge.
6:32
And from a number standpoint, it is, like you mentioned, the
6:35
undocumented, the asylum seekers.
6:38
But what you're mentioning is have the individuals who are working,
6:43
who wanna work in a different country, global corporations.
6:46
And you would think that would be a relatively straightforward process.
6:51
what it sounds like is that's not the case at all.
6:54
So when CEO or university presidents come to you, what's their top
6:58
frustrations about bringing international talent to America?
7:02
Melissa Harms: I think when you look at the corporation side,
7:04
they're frustrated because they can't get the workers they need.
7:07
And our immigration system for visas is incredibly archaic.
7:12
The most common visa we have is the H one B visa, and I think most
7:16
people have heard of that now.
7:17
There's been a lot of press about that.
7:19
But the H one B status.
7:21
It's only for people who have a bachelor's degree in a certain field, and the
7:25
job requires a degree in that field.
7:27
And over the years, without any sort of legislation or rulemaking U-S-C-I-S
7:32
has narrowed that definition to be only, it only really benefits those
7:37
who have, let's say, a chemistry degree and they're gonna be a chemist.
7:40
But in the business world in fact, they came out with a proposed rule a few years
7:45
ago that says we don't consider business degrees to be specialized degrees.
7:49
So if you're looking at, you come out and you are.
7:51
You started a company and you're A CEO, they'll say you don't qualify for H
7:55
one B because you could have a number of different degrees to be A CEO.
7:58
You could have a degree in English, you could have a degree in marketing,
8:00
you could have a degree in finance.
8:02
So they're really looking for the hard science, the analytical fields
8:06
to be eligible for H one B status.
8:08
And that's all we've got.
8:09
Unless you're from another country, we have very specific narrow visa
8:13
categories for those from Australia, Mexico Chile, Singapore, and Canada.
8:19
But other than that's it.
8:20
We can bring people over if they've been employed abroad.
8:23
But we don't have a catchall for just the very smart person who's
8:27
starting a company, quite frankly.
8:29
So there's a giant hole in the Visa framework for, what
8:33
we see in today's economy.
8:34
And the, we started out talking about how.
8:38
Immigration is late 1946, and it really is, we haven't had a
8:41
substantive change to our business immigration framework in many years.
8:46
Dave Conley: H one B visas our research is saying it's about, it's only about 85,000
8:51
people a year that that qualify for that.
8:56
And what would you say to folks that, that are thinking that somehow this
9:02
depresses American jobs like Microsoft just fired 9,000 people, and yet they're
9:09
also asking for a record number of visas.
9:12
Now, personally, I don't think those two things are like that.
9:16
The pie isn't, finite like that.
9:18
But what do you say to people who think that this is something that actually hurts
9:23
Americans rather than helps everyone?
9:26
Melissa Harms: I think if you believe in capitalism, the
9:28
markets correct themselves.
9:30
So what I will tell you is that an HOV Visa can cost as much as $3,400.
9:35
In just filing fees.
9:37
And on top of that, if you wanna have an answer in three weeks, as
9:41
opposed to six months, you have to pay $2,500 more to the government.
9:46
So you're looking at 6,000 in government fees before you pay my fees.
9:50
So companies don't wanna do this unless they have to.
9:53
So I have a lot of companies, and I'm on retainer with companies.
9:56
That's how we generally work.
9:57
They'll say, when we need a Visa, we're gonna call you.
10:00
And I have a lot of 'em that say, you know what, we're not
10:01
gonna do any H one B sponsorship.
10:03
We're just, we're, we feel like we're just.
10:04
Gonna save those costs and hire American workers.
10:07
And I say, great.
10:08
And then I get a call the next week we've had this job open for, 10 months.
10:12
Nobody's applied, or the people who have applied have just been way
10:15
underqualified and we need a visa.
10:17
So the cost of doing these H one visas is a, impediment to, no company's
10:23
gonna do this unless they have to.
10:24
So you will see them laying off workers, but they're generally
10:28
not gonna be laying off workers in categories that are hard to fill.
10:31
So they are still hiring H one B workers when they can't find anybody else.
10:36
And I think if you look at the way the markets set, the demand is out
10:40
there and immigration fluctuates.
10:41
We have a lottery each year for people who are getting their first H one B,
10:45
and we do this whole archaic thing where we sent in these petitions to
10:49
U-S-C-I-S to be counted in the lottery.
10:52
And the petitions were, three inches thick.
10:54
They cost me about $50 to FedEx.
10:57
And we had to send in the entire prepared petition, and then they would
11:00
run a lottery and send back the ones that they didn't choose at the expense.
11:05
And I always looked at this of $10 per application they sent back in postage.
11:10
So this archaic way, finally, we had an electronic system only
11:14
within the last five years where we now do this electronically first.
11:18
We've been looking at the numbers and what we've seen as.
11:21
As the economy gets worse and there's not as many jobs open, there are less
11:26
applications for H one B numbers.
11:28
So we see it fluctuate based on the way the economy runs.
11:31
We used to, under Clinton, the numbers went up, so now we have,
11:35
you're right about 85,000 total.
11:37
Under Clinton, it was raised to about a hundred and let's
11:40
see, 195,000 at one point.
11:42
And back then we didn't use them all.
11:44
We never used them all.
11:45
Now, in today's economy this past year we had, let's see, 358,000 registrations.
11:52
And they selected of that, they selected 120,000.
11:55
Now, this was down from last year when we had 480,000.
11:58
So you see the economy works in seeing how many of these are selected.
12:02
And I do have clients that will put somebody in a lottery and
12:05
then they're chosen on the lottery and they're really excited.
12:07
And then the company will say, you know what?
12:10
Hard times we don't have that job anymore.
12:12
We're not actually gonna file the petition for that selected person.
12:14
We do see that happen when the company feels like there's not a
12:17
need for that position anymore.
12:20
Dave Conley: In previous episodes I've talked about how medieval this system is.
12:25
Can you walk me through sort of the experience of, a student and they wanna
12:30
stay in the United States and I know, in our research there's something like
12:34
the OTP and you get to stay here for a little bit, but then you like take your
12:37
chances versus somebody who's overseas wants to come to the United States.
12:44
Or is there like yet another category?
12:46
What are the different things that people try in order to either hire in the United
12:51
States or stay in the United States?
12:53
Melissa Harms: So what we see is there's really three, again, I'll use buckets
12:56
that these H one B applicants come from.
12:59
Majority.
13:00
I would say, and this is totally off the top of my head with my
13:03
cases, 80% of those are students who graduated from a US school.
13:07
So these are people who come in on a student visa, an F1 when
13:11
they graduate from a US school.
13:12
They get one year of OPT as you said.
13:16
If they have a degree in a STEM field, which is designated by their school,
13:20
they can get an additional two years.
13:22
So they get three years total to work in a STEM field without the employer having to
13:27
spend money sponsor them, sponsoring them.
13:29
So during that time I tell employers, if you wanna keep this person, you
13:35
should put them in the lottery the first year that they are eligible.
13:38
Because about every year, and this is a really rough estimate, you have
13:43
about a 25% chance of selection.
13:45
So with three years, you're not guaranteed to get an H one B number.
13:48
So you need to try every year.
13:50
I have one individual who has been through the lottery nine
13:53
times, never been selected.
13:55
So there are those outliers.
13:57
So that's the, these are the students and those are, that's
14:00
probably the biggest bucket of who's applying for these H one B visas.
14:03
The people outside the US are, those are not, they're not that many of
14:07
them because they need to have the exposure to the US employers to have
14:12
the US employer feel like, Hey, I really wanna bring this person over.
14:15
I really wanna spend this, five to $10,000 trying to hire this person.
14:19
There's not a lot like that.
14:21
We might have some who came here for a little while, worked for us, employer went
14:24
back, and now they're trying to come back.
14:25
That might be one of or somebody who works for an overseas
14:28
subsidiary and wants to come here.
14:31
Then the third bucket is people who are here in some their status who wanna move
14:34
to H one B. A lot of times that will be somebody who's here on what we call
14:38
an L one, and that's an intercompany transferee where you work abroad for
14:41
the company for a year, and then you can come here on an L. The L is great
14:46
in many ways, but the H is better for long-term green card processing.
14:50
So some of those people are switching.
14:52
We had people switching out of the tn, which was for Mexicans and Canadians
14:57
because of fear of what Trump was gonna do with the TN visa category.
15:00
So there's always, we always have fear-based switching h fours, sometimes
15:04
it's a dependent of an HMBV holder.
15:07
They might say, I got a job and now I wanna move into H one B. 'cause
15:11
most of the time they cannot work.
15:12
They get to a certain point in the Green card process for the spouse
15:16
that they can get a work permit.
15:17
But most of the time these spouses of these H one B workers cannot work.
15:20
And that's difficult, especially in the Bay Area, to have a single income family.
15:24
So they're trying to get their own H one B. So those are the types of people who
15:27
would be applying for this H one B status.
15:31
Jerremy Newsome: So
15:31
Melissa Harms: It's a lot.
15:32
I know.
15:32
I get too technical so feel free to tell me to dumb it down.
15:35
Dave Conley: This is perfect because, in order to really, we have to define these
15:39
problems, and if people's eyes are glazing over right now, that's a good thing.
15:43
Because should be simple.
15:46
That's the first thing.
15:47
I don't know, in one of our episodes, it's like somebody took the worst of the
15:51
tax code, drank themselves into oblivion and said, immigrate to the United States,
15:56
Melissa Harms: I tell people that clients, especially when I meet with
15:58
new companies, I say, you really should not need me, but you do.
16:01
Our system is probably the most complicated and
16:04
archaic in the entire world.
16:06
And quite frankly, doesn't serve the American population well some
16:09
of these policies I look at and what was the policy behind this
16:12
and who were they trying to help?
16:14
Because it really doesn't help.
16:16
Another thing that people might not realize about the H one B system
16:18
is that the employers have to say they're paying the hire of the
16:21
prevailing wage and the actual wage.
16:23
For that position, in that location.
16:27
So the reason they do that is they say, we wanna protect US workers.
16:31
We don't want companies to come in, fire all their US workers and hire
16:34
H one B workers and underpay them.
16:36
Great intent.
16:37
I see where that's going.
16:38
But the way it plays out in a lot of my cases, I can't even tell you how many, is
16:44
that our prevailing wage is set by the, we use this government database for wages.
16:50
And I don't know where they are getting their data.
16:53
They don't even cite it.
16:55
But it's incredibly high.
16:56
So what happens is somebody will call me and say, I wanna hire a software engineer.
17:01
In Silicon Valley, and I'll say, great, the prevailing wage for that is 240,000.
17:05
And they say, there's no way I'm gonna pay that person 240,000.
17:08
I say that's the prevailing wage.
17:11
And so they'll either A, not hire them, or B, they'll hire them and
17:15
pay them like twice as much as they're paying their US workers.
17:18
In effect, it doesn't do what it's supposed to do, put it that way.
17:22
I think if we had a workable wage database that was actually accurate
17:25
it does have a good intent behind it, but it just doesn't work.
17:29
Jerremy Newsome: And so you also teach HR professionals about immigration.
17:33
What are the common misconceptions they hold about, the process or
17:38
any individuals that might really hurt the ability to hire talent?
17:42
Melissa Harms: This kind of comes back to you shouldn't need me, but you do.
17:45
One of the things I tell them is, before you hire anybody.
17:49
We have certain questions you can ask without violating any
17:52
discrimination laws about whether or not the person needs sponsorship.
17:55
So before you hire somebody, come to me and I have them give me the resume,
18:01
the job description, and the salary.
18:03
We also have a short questionnaire.
18:04
We ask anybody who says they need sponsorship to fill out so I can make
18:08
sure there's a visa that works because there's a lot of times where they
18:11
wanna hire somebody and say, I'm sorry.
18:13
There's just nothing we can do for that person.
18:15
So that's the first thing I tell HR people is just talk to
18:18
me before you extend an offer.
18:20
And that, and it's also comes to educating them on what can be done
18:24
for people and what the costs are.
18:25
A lot of times they don't realize how much this costs.
18:28
And I find myself in many occasions, talking them out of hiring somebody
18:33
because the costs are so high, they're not gonna be able to keep them for long.
18:36
The chances are low that their case is gonna get approved.
18:39
I think just having an open dialogue with an immigration attorney is
18:42
probably the first thing they can learn.
18:45
Dave Conley: And so everybody pays, right?
18:46
So the worker is in this place of uncertainty for sometimes years.
18:52
The businesses have to pay all these fees and they're stuck in this uncertainty.
18:55
Am I gonna have this person?
18:56
Am I not?
18:58
this is, none of this could actually help businesses, right?
19:02
There's no upside to this.
19:03
Is there?
19:04
Melissa Harms: no.
19:05
There really isn't.
19:05
And we have people who aren't selected the lottery.
19:07
These students, some of these are PhDs from Stanford.
19:10
I had a situation with one of my biotech clients several years ago where the
19:15
individual just didn't get the h. She had been here in F1 after her PhD, so
19:19
she had to move back to, I think they moved her to Hong Kong where they had an
19:22
office, opened a lab there for her, and then hired all the lab workers in Hong
19:27
Kong that they would've hired in the US if she could run her lab in the us.
19:32
But because she could not get a degree or could not get an H one B,
19:36
we couldn't, she couldn't work here.
19:37
So those are some of the things, what we're seeing now with the current
19:40
administration, there is something called an Extraordinary Ability
19:43
visa that we use for a lot of these scientists and highly trained workers.
19:47
And we're seeing U-S-C-I-S crack down on those and say, this
19:50
person isn't extraordinary, or.
19:52
This work is not the national interest.
19:54
Under Biden there was a sort of streamlined approach to this, what
19:57
we call a national interest waiver which is a green card application
20:01
for people in the STEM fields.
20:03
And basically if you could prove that your work was the national interest and
20:07
you had a PhD in the STEM field, it was an expedited route to this green card.
20:12
I filed one for somebody who has a PhD in chemical engineering and he's worked
20:17
at a biotech company for many years.
20:20
He has whole departments reporting to him and they just said he
20:22
wasn't extraordinary enough.
20:24
So in the last 12 months, we've seen this national interest waiver
20:27
applications go down the tubes as well.
20:29
I think the Biden administration had the interest of promoting the
20:33
economy and promoting innovation and entrepreneurship in mind.
20:37
I don't know what the current administration has in mind, honestly.
20:40
Jerremy Newsome: I've heard people say that before.
20:42
Melissa Harms: Yeah.
20:43
That was about as diplomatic as I could put it, right?
20:45
Jerremy Newsome: That was nice.
20:45
I like that diplomacy.
20:48
So in regards to what you kinda mentioned, like the different, graduates that
20:52
are getting specific degrees, you see some that are outside of the STEM that
20:58
people should or could focus more on
21:02
Melissa Harms: I think particularly with your entrepreneurs now, some
21:05
business schools, and I do work with, a business school here in the Bay Area.
21:09
Many of the top tier business schools have been able to get their programs
21:13
designated as STEM programs with a business degree, which is fantastic.
21:17
'cause then their graduates get that three years.
21:19
But I'm not sure how long that will last.
21:21
I'm always scared to point out the good things because somebody will
21:23
listen to this and shut 'em down.
21:25
But, if that changes, I think we have a real hole for entrepreneurs and
21:29
we had an international entrepreneur rule that was so complicated and
21:33
convoluted that immigration attorneys just wouldn't even touch it.
21:35
But we need something for the people who are building the economy and
21:39
our entrepreneurs out there, that may not have a STEM degree but
21:43
are still, fantastic individuals who are going to contribute jobs.
21:49
I think everything should be geared towards job creation.
21:52
And there are many visas that have been but it's not the
21:55
way the economy works now.
21:57
So we need an economist to come in and say, how can we simulate the
22:00
US economy through immigration?
22:03
Dave Conley: Tell me a little bit about the penalties.
22:05
Certainly if you're here undocumented, particularly in areas like
22:10
construction or farming or service level jobs, and you're undocumented.
22:17
There isn't that big of a penalty.
22:19
They keep on doing it.
22:20
I happen to live in Florida.
22:22
It's one of the few states that mandate, like E-Verify to hire people.
22:27
But when it comes to legal, immigration, people going through
22:30
this process, what's the downside to a business saying, ah, screw it.
22:35
We're just going to keep this person here.
22:36
We're just gonna keep going in this process.
22:39
Melissa Harms: It's a, that's a complicated question.
22:40
There are a number of different types of penalties based on that.
22:43
If you had somebody who was an H one B and you knew that their h had expired
22:47
and you didn't care, you just hired them.
22:50
You have the basic i nine penalties.
22:52
But then you have, if there's a knowing violation you can attach
22:55
even criminal penalties, not only the company, but to the HR representative.
22:59
So there are a number of different it depends on what the degree of malicious.
23:03
Intent was as to what your penalties could be.
23:06
But the simple I nine penalties quite frankly are not that high.
23:09
I don't have them in front of me, but we're talking hundreds of thousands
23:12
of dollars, which is a drop in the bucket for a lot of these companies.
23:16
I think the bigger issue and I think you might be reading these reports
23:20
and I'm not like, these are not usually my type of clients 'cause I'm
23:24
working with more, people who are.
23:26
Doing highly skilled workers and they don't have a lot of undocumented workers.
23:30
But you'll look at these.
23:32
I just read an article in New York Times yesterday about a meat processing
23:35
plant in, I think it was IL or somewhere that had been rated and lost 70% of
23:41
the workforce who was using E-Verify.
23:43
So you know this, and in the owner of the company has always been Republican.
23:48
He voted, he actually voted in 2024 for Democrat because of the
23:53
potential impact on his workers for these immigration wa raids.
23:57
And he's gonna have to shut down because he is lost 70% of his workforce.
24:01
So that I think is what has a lot of those type of employers running.
24:05
Scared is not so much the penalties they'll face, but if they're rated,
24:09
what's gonna happen to their workforce because they rely on those workers.
24:12
Jerremy Newsome: Yeah.
24:13
Makes sense.
24:14
You're talking about the scale, some of the companies just describe that.
24:17
Is there certain companies that are just demoralized by all of this happening
24:22
and that have to have current employers here that just simply cannot go and
24:27
find any immigrants to come over?
24:30
Melissa Harms: Again, these really aren't the clients I'm working for.
24:32
But I think if you look in the restaurants and the agricultural
24:35
fields, manufacturing, that's where you're gonna see the hardest hit.
24:39
I'm very close to Napa Valley and I think that, you're gonna see a lot of these
24:44
agricultural workers in Napa be affected.
24:46
I think the fear is a really big part of
24:49
What's happening now.
24:50
There are certain companies or certain.
24:53
I know wineries people just don't show up 'cause they're scared
24:55
that ICE is gonna show up there.
24:57
There's all sorts of websites that track where ICE is and people are
25:00
scared to go into those communities where they know ICE is going to be.
25:04
And, on a personal level I see these kids, these high school kids, or I have
25:09
high school children, but these kids who are scared about their parents being
25:14
deported, what is that gonna do to me?
25:16
That's a whole other sector from what I do.
25:17
But I think what, my employers and my clients are facing is how are we gonna
25:22
get the talent we need and how do we continue to be innovative and develop
25:27
the drugs that we wanna develop or, come up with these new technologies
25:31
without the best and the brightest.
25:33
And America's starting to sound like a place that doesn't welcome
25:36
the best and the brightest.
25:37
Dave Conley: It's not, it's something I had from a personal.
25:40
Somebody in my life was that their visa was through their employer and in a
25:45
way, she was trapped with the employer.
25:49
Melissa Harms: Yes.
25:50
Dave Conley: So tell me about that.
25:52
And what are some of the downsides to having this employee based
25:56
Melissa Harms: Yeah.
25:57
That's hard, it's almost indentured servitude because you get hired
26:01
by this employer and the life cycle of a foreign worker.
26:05
They're hired maybe as a student with that OPT and then
26:08
they get they H one B lottery.
26:11
They work with the employer.
26:13
Now they can go work for another employer.
26:15
But that new employer has to do the h again, they don't have to go through the
26:18
lottery, but they have to pay all those ridiculous fees we just talked about.
26:21
So that's what they have to do if they leave companies.
26:24
Now, the scary part for them is what if they get laid off?
26:28
They don't have a job anymore.
26:29
They essentially have a 60 day grace period to find a new job
26:34
without having to leave the us.
26:35
Which, if you're a senior level person, that's just not easily done.
26:40
So that's very scary.
26:41
And then, the other side of this is that if they wanna stay here past
26:44
that six years, so you get a total of six years in H one B status.
26:48
If you wanna stay here, if you start having kids here and you develop
26:52
your professional network here.
26:54
You have to have the company file a green card for you and you talk about
26:59
archaic, where, I could get into that.
27:00
But that's where the company has to recruit and prove there's
27:04
a shortage of US workers.
27:06
And they have all these things they have to do, these recruitment
27:08
steps they have to take.
27:10
One of which is putting two Sunday newspaper ads, which if you'll go pick
27:15
up a Sunday newspaper, the Chronicle or wherever you are, New York Times
27:19
has them, I would say 80% of those newspaper help wanted ads are for
27:24
the green card process for a foreign national, because they have to be done.
27:27
No, I'm serious because I know what they look like.
27:30
We have to write 'em a certain way so I can pick up the newspaper.
27:33
I'm like that's a perma.
27:34
That's a perma.
27:35
That's a perma.
27:36
So they have to go out and recruit for this position.
27:39
And then once they go through this.
27:41
Really two year process of just getting the thing on file or getting it approved.
27:45
They have more steps.
27:46
They have to wait for a green card number to come up because we have only a
27:50
certain number of green cards per year.
27:52
Like we have H one Bs per year.
27:53
So they're waiting and waiting and the whole time they're
27:56
stuck with that employer.
27:57
They do get to a certain point very far in the process where they
28:00
could change employers, but it's years and years down the line.
28:04
So now that they've had this employer file for them and spend all this
28:07
money and get this approved to a certain point, they're still stuck
28:10
with that employer and that job.
28:12
That job has to remained somewhat the same.
28:14
You can allow for a little bit of career progression, but if you get hired as a.
28:19
Analyst and now you're running the whole department.
28:22
That's a completely different job and you need now a whole new recruitment process
28:25
and proving shortage and all of that.
28:27
So that's where it gets really bad.
28:29
And that's where you really talk about the indenture servitude.
28:31
'cause these employees have to stay with the same employer for so many years.
28:35
Dave Conley: And she couldn't like at some point in the process, like she
28:37
wasn't allowed to leave the United States for years, and then she needed all
28:41
these like invasive like medical tests.
28:44
And I'm like, oh, come on.
28:45
Is that real?
28:46
Melissa Harms: yeah.
28:47
We have to, they have to do medical exams.
28:49
There's a certain period of time where they can't leave because of certain
28:52
paperwork we're filing if they don't have an underlying non-immigrant visa.
28:56
I find it hilarious that we've got, this health and human services
29:00
secretary who doesn't want vaccines, but our four nationals have to have
29:03
three COVID vaccines and everything else under the sun before they
29:06
can become a green card holder.
29:09
So it's, yeah, it is a very long, very expensive process from start to finish.
29:15
Just to give you an idea on the, and this is something that shocks a lot of people
29:18
for these employment-based green cards.
29:20
So if you're being sponsored by an employer and you don't have a
29:23
family member to sponsor you we have that, I think it's 144,000
29:27
per year only for green cards.
29:30
And it's broken down by country of birth and your preference category.
29:35
And so the country of birth was that we wanted to have a diverse country.
29:39
So we don't want one single country to, to have all the green cards, right?
29:43
So the countries with the highest demand have the longest waits.
29:46
So if you're from China, for example, right now the visa bullets and
29:50
that we get every month, if you're from China actually India's worse.
29:54
So if you're from India you could be waiting 12 years for a grain card
29:59
If your employer sponsors you.
30:00
Yeah.
30:01
Jerremy Newsome: whoa.
30:02
Melissa Harms: So it's, it's just a crazy system.
30:05
And it also seems very unfair.
30:07
'cause you're from India and you wait 12 years, but if you were born in
30:10
Pakistan, you wait a year and a half.
30:15
And that's all based on demand.
30:16
That's the whole point.
30:17
And there's been a lot of different proposals in Congress to eliminate
30:21
the per country limitations.
30:22
None of which have succeeded.
30:24
Nothing succeeds in Congress about immigration anymore, but this one has
30:28
been one that a lot of people have advocated for, to make it more fair.
30:31
But yeah it's definitely a broken system.
30:34
Jerremy Newsome: Just dancing around that for a second.
30:35
The latest federal spending bill had major fee increases.
30:41
Do you see any of these rising costs throughout the system affecting
30:43
more Visa business sponsorships?
30:45
Melissa Harms: Yeah, the Visa fees went up dramatically.
30:48
In 2024, there was a new fee increase.
30:50
And we have now we have a $600 asylum fee that's added on to every single
30:55
case we file 300 if you're from a small employer that has less than 26 employees.
31:00
That was completely new.
31:02
That was supposedly to fund the asylum program, and this
31:05
is just for H one B workers.
31:06
And then the fees themselves went up, I think 70% for an H one B. So
31:10
the fees have gone up dramatically.
31:12
Like I said, a lot of these employers really need these people.
31:15
So that Delta was not enough to dissuade them just from the filing
31:19
fees when you're talking H one Bs.
31:21
But, I think the fees just incredibly start to get more and
31:25
more unbearable as things progress.
31:28
Jerremy Newsome: Yeah.
31:28
Melissa Harms: it's expensive.
31:30
Jerremy Newsome: Yep.
31:31
Dave Conley: fees go?
31:31
Do they fund what is it, the U-S-C-I-S or what, or they just go into the ether?
31:37
Melissa Harms: So the, there's a filing fee that's supposed to just fund the
31:40
cost of adjudicating the petition.
31:42
U-S-C-A-S is supposedly self-sufficient.
31:45
It's supposed to generate its own fees.
31:47
Then there's a fee, there's a $500 fraud fee, which is what it's called.
31:51
And that goes to this FDNS unit, which is fraud detection,
31:54
national security, I think.
31:56
And they go out actually, and this is a very active unit.
31:59
They go out to employers and will say, okay, you filed an H one B
32:03
petition on behalf of Joe Schmo.
32:05
I wanna talk to Joe Schmo and make sure he's doing what you
32:07
said he did in the petition.
32:08
And I've had many of my clients have been visited by those fraud officers
32:11
and that $500 fee funds that department.
32:15
We've never had a problem with the fraud officers because as I'm lucky to have
32:19
clients who are actually employing people in the capacity that they say they are.
32:23
And then there's a $1,500 education retraining fee that is supposed
32:28
to go back into US education.
32:31
I've never, really tracked that fund that's part of the H one B fees.
32:34
But that was the intent of that was let's educate US workers so
32:38
they can do these jobs that we're getting forward workers to do.
32:41
And that's actually one of my personal feelings about the whole
32:44
process is that we do need to look at our education system because we're
32:49
not churning out the science, the employees that our employers need.
32:53
So there should be a better look at our education systems and.
32:56
I can get on my high horse, California and its schools and how expensive it is
33:01
to go to the California universities and how hard it is to get into a University
33:05
of California or even a Cal State School.
33:07
They need to look at giving more money to education here in the us for sure.
33:12
Jerremy Newsome: Or at least doing it correctly.
33:14
Melissa Harms: Yes.
33:15
Jerremy Newsome: Yeah,
33:16
Melissa Harms: Yeah.
33:16
Jerremy Newsome: lot of money.
33:16
I mean that, that was why Dave, me and Dave asked that
33:18
question once in an episode.
33:19
Where's the money going?
33:21
Melissa Harms: Oh, it is a, it's a, and let's trace it.
33:23
I'd love to see where, all those H one B fees go.
33:26
Yeah.
33:28
Our government is really good about being transparent in immigration.
33:30
Let me tell you that.
33:32
Jerremy Newsome: Oh, the best we're number one for sure.
33:36
So if you had to sum this up, you can do it delicately or not.
33:41
What is working, is there a portion of this?
33:44
You're like, man, we're crushing it here.
33:46
We're doing really great.
33:48
Melissa Harms: I think one of my frustrations with H one Bs, and again,
33:51
I keep coming back to those 'cause it really is 70 to 80% of what we do.
33:54
One of my frustrations with those has been the way they change the adjudication
33:58
standards without any sort of lawmaking.
34:00
They just say, Nope, that doesn't count as a specialty occupation.
34:04
When they had more lax standards about those H one Bs, it did work.
34:09
And when we didn't have this lottery system for H one Bs, it did work because
34:14
like I said, when companies can hire a US worker and not pay these fees, they will,
34:19
and having those, even those inflated salary surveys, just having some sort
34:23
of salary protection on there, it works.
34:26
What I think would work better is some sort of point system where we can look
34:30
at, and, other countries do this, where we look at the individual's education,
34:35
we look at, not if it's a. Bachelor's degree, but look at a points, look at
34:39
how long they've worked in the industry.
34:41
Look at, how, what is their impact gonna be on the US economy.
34:45
Like some sort of point system where we capture it in a different way.
34:49
I think that could really work.
34:50
I think the NIW, the streamlined MI Ws for cases where people really are
34:55
doing important work, we need that back.
34:58
We need some sort of way to get these cases approved for people who are
35:03
generating money and jobs for Americans.
35:07
So that was a really
35:08
Jerremy Newsome: No,
35:08
Brilliant.
35:09
Melissa Harms: flaky response because there's not too much
35:11
that's working great right now.
35:13
Jerremy Newsome: you gave me a good segue because looking at Canada's point
35:16
based immigration system, maybe you know, Australia's regional programs where it's
35:22
easier to immigrate to underpopulated areas, you feel like that would be a
35:27
very relevant thing to make a shift into.
35:29
Melissa Harms: I do.
35:29
And I'm definitely on the moderate side of immigration.
35:33
There are people who feel like we should have open borders and
35:36
I don't think we can do that.
35:37
I want common sense immigration reform, but it should make sense with
35:41
balancing the needs of US workers against what we need to remain relevant
35:47
the world economy and innovative.
35:48
I think that we're, especially, we haven't really talked about this,
35:52
but the recent crackdown on American universities from the current
35:56
administration we're gonna lose our best and brightest of the university setting.
35:59
And I think that's the beginning of the end to me.
36:02
Jerremy Newsome: Yeah.
36:02
Valid.
36:03
Talking about that.
36:04
'cause I'm a huge educational guy.
36:06
If you could the student to worker transition process.
36:12
What type of pathway would that look like?
36:15
Or how would that kind of be reformatted, Melissa?
36:18
Melissa Harms: I think what would be great is to have some of these
36:21
workers work under this, like what we call OPT and be required to do OPT
36:28
before they transition to H but not have them worry about the lottery.
36:32
So if they had.
36:32
Three years of work experience under OPT, then they didn't have
36:35
to go into the lottery because then you can have employers really try
36:39
'em out and make sure that they're really somebody they wanna invest in.
36:42
Because if, and I have this happen all the time, where somebody will
36:45
say, the company will say we hired this person, but they're just not
36:48
cutting it, so we're gonna lay 'em off.
36:50
So give them a chance to train them and figure out if they are worth it before
36:55
they sponsor them for H one B, but don't have it be this fear-based system
36:59
where I better sponsor them or they'll never get a chance to work with me.
37:02
Jerremy Newsome: Yep.
37:04
And for universities watching international enrollment drop, do you have
37:08
any creative approaches within current law that could help retain graduates?
37:13
Melissa Harms: I also am, and this may not be popular, but I do think it has to be
37:16
balanced number of foreign students too.
37:18
I do think especially our public institutions that you set a realistic.
37:23
Level for how many foreign students you're gonna accept.
37:26
And then you work with your budget that way.
37:27
'cause I think that's been frustration in the uc system is that there was a point
37:31
in time where there were so many foreign students and that California student
37:35
kids weren't getting into these schools.
37:37
So I think you have to look at that, but I think that maybe the federal
37:40
level, the federal government comes up with a, percentage for how many
37:45
J ones and F ones you can give out.
37:48
And then we're gonna make up that shortfall in the budget
37:51
with federal funding, in your budget for whatever you need.
37:55
And then they get the best, the brightest for those students.
37:57
But, you also need to develop pathways for us kids to, to get
38:02
into those institutions as well.
38:05
It's a broken, we get a whole, I could do a whole podcast with you on
38:09
getting your children into college.
38:10
'cause I just went into that and how broken that system is because the.
38:14
Jerremy Newsome: We'll have to get back.
38:15
Melissa Harms: That is a mess.
38:17
Let me tell you now.
38:18
Jerremy Newsome: I will say the only, and I can only speak from two states the
38:23
only two states, and then we'll probably get back into the general topic, but the
38:26
only two states that I know of that do it correctly, from my current knowledge, and
38:31
Georgia do a great job on a state base of the Hopes program and dual enrollment,
38:36
Where, you know, you go to high school and you go to a free dual enrollment
38:40
program with a community college.
38:41
And when you're in that community college, that counts for high school
38:43
and college credits without taking any like honors or AP or anything like that.
38:48
So when you graduate high school.
38:50
If you already have two years of college done the ability, once you've done a
38:54
dual enrollment in Florida or Georgia, to get into a college, at least for me,
38:58
again my SAT scores is like a nine 30.
39:02
I'm a, have a nine, I have a 97 iq.
39:05
I do I've taken tests, it's whatever.
39:08
But I went right into University of Florida, top 10, college,
39:13
business school in the nation.
39:16
there was some that do it correctly.
39:17
But to your point, you have to be in that state.
39:19
You have to live in that state, you have to go to school in that state.
39:22
Good grades in that state.
39:23
So there's a lot of aspects that do approach that.
39:26
But I really enjoy kinda like what you mentioned in the sense of there
39:30
should be some type of system approach where you have US based students,
39:36
obviously international based students obviously, but if the internationals
39:39
do wanna stay here, get visas, get working, visas working into a
39:42
transition, like just having that be.
39:45
Grade related, right?
39:47
Like how do they do, how do their scores do?
39:50
What
39:50
Do?
39:50
What type of jobs are they trying to get?
39:52
And then making the employment so much easier.
39:55
'cause that kind of blows my mind a little bit, that a company
39:58
can sponsor someone and they're in India and it takes 12 years.
40:03
That's like the fourth of someone's life.
40:05
Melissa Harms: Yes.
40:06
To get a green card.
40:07
Jerremy Newsome: already said, yes, let's do this.
40:09
Melissa Harms: I think getting back to the student I mean I think that's
40:11
where the system is broken right now is that you do have this connection
40:15
between the schools and the employers.
40:19
We bring in these foreign students and we bring in a lot of them and we
40:24
bring 'em in to get educated here.
40:26
So when we're bringing 'em in to get educated here, there needs to
40:30
be a pathway for them to stay and implement that education, right?
40:35
So that's why the federal government, in some ways does need to get involved in
40:39
the students and how many they're bringing over are they just bringing 'em over?
40:42
'cause they can pay full tuition.
40:43
'cause a lot of schools.
40:45
The foreign students pay more, right?
40:47
So they make a lot of money off the foreign students.
40:49
Bring 'em over but then there's gonna be no pathway for them to stay.
40:52
It creates this friction right there.
40:54
So that's where there needs to be.
40:56
If you are brought into a US school and you are in that top percent to be at that
41:01
institution, then I feel like there should be a way for you to stay here and work in
41:05
the us But let's not bring over, I don't even know the numbers, but 10 million
41:10
foreign students and only have a pathway for 85,000 of them to stay, every year.
41:15
That's where I feel like the breakdown happens is that these students
41:19
come in with the feeling that once I graduate from here, I can stay.
41:21
Or maybe that's made clear that they can't, from the outset,
41:24
Jerremy Newsome: yeah.
41:26
That's a topic of immigration that I. Definitely know that not a lot of people
41:29
are discussing right now, which I'm so happy to have you on this podcast for.
41:33
Because again, right now, especially with the Trump administration and it's
41:37
all about alligator Alcatraz and the undocumented and the asylum seekers.
41:41
But to that point, is a huge portion that's affected by
41:45
totally different aspects.
41:47
We're like, Hey, listen, I'm working.
41:49
I pay taxes.
41:50
I'm a student.
41:51
I'm here.
41:52
I'm spending money in this economy.
41:53
I'm spending money in this country.
41:54
I have a job, I work here, and I can't even get it.
41:59
I can't stay in.
42:01
That is definitely a wild broach.
42:03
So I don't think people are even really truly discussing.
42:06
Melissa Harms: And expanding on that from the business students I talked to,
42:08
there's some people, these individuals with these amazing ideas and they
42:12
say to me, I wanna start a business.
42:14
I've got funding.
42:15
Can I hire myself for H one B?
42:18
We have some rules that are making it a little easier on them, but
42:21
not great.
42:22
And it is hard.
42:23
So let's have a way for them when they're starting a new business after graduating
42:27
from a top five business school for them to be able to start it and try it.
42:31
And let's see what happens.
42:32
Maybe it's a short term, you get a five-year visa at a tryout your
42:36
business, but let's figure out a way if we're gonna bring 'em in, and
42:39
they're these amazing people to have 'em stay if they're gonna come here.
42:44
Jerremy Newsome: yeah.
42:45
'Cause you talked about, the entrepreneurship route and potentially
42:48
that having some different application process or awareness process point system.
42:54
It makes sense to me.
42:56
be beyond federal reform, Melissa, and we're talking about schools too.
43:01
I was like, what can states and cities do?
43:04
Actually to help businesses access global talent,
43:08
Melissa Harms: Quite frankly, there's not a lot they can do because
43:11
immigration law is all federal.
43:12
So to get these visas, they're really working on the federal.
43:15
I have a lot of great employers who are doing things like helping the people
43:19
on DACA transition from DACA into an H one B. Really trying to look at their
43:25
workforce with a holistic view of how can we help some of these people,
43:29
asylum seekers, and maybe helping with some of their fees or whatever.
43:34
Because a lot of these people who are in that other bucket I talked about
43:37
are actually working at companies in lawful status, but they're just
43:41
in this very transitory phase.
43:43
I do encourage employers to look at sort of ways to be helpful to
43:47
your foreign national workforce other than just sponsorship.
43:51
Jerremy Newsome: Yeah.
43:51
And for the small businesses, Melissa, like small business owners
43:54
who needs international talent, but fears the system, what are three
43:59
practical steps that they could take this week, in your opinion?
44:04
Melissa Harms: That's a really good question.
44:05
I do work with a lot of small employers who are very.
44:09
They're so nervous about doing it about sponsoring somebody for H one B, and I
44:13
think the first thing I do is say that's usually a student that they've hired
44:16
that they wanna get an H one B for, and I just lay out the costs and say, you
44:20
just have to know these are the costs and these are what you could be sacrificing.
44:24
And as long as they're willing to do that then we go forward.
44:27
And it's just honestly, find a partner who will, an immigration partner who will
44:31
explain everything to you very clearly and simply about what happens next.
44:36
And it's hard to understand, but walk you through the whole process because that's
44:40
what we need with those smaller employers.
44:42
I do encourage all my employers to sign up for E-Verify.
44:45
I know it's.
44:47
It's not the best system, but it does show a good faith approach
44:50
to following the immigration laws.
44:52
So I think E-Verify is definitely useful.
44:55
Again, not perfect.
44:56
And then I think another thing that you would wanna look at are some of the,
45:02
causes you can help in your community.
45:04
There are a lot of different, there's a group I work with called Talent Beyond
45:07
Boundaries, and they help bring in highly skilled workers who are working.
45:12
You might have an engineer that's in a Syrian basement that would
45:16
like to do, electrical engineering somewhere very qualified, so they try
45:20
to match them up with us employers.
45:21
Look at ways like that to find talent where you can't find American workers.
45:25
So being a little creative and there are a lot of great ways
45:28
you can help for nationals and still help your business succeed.
45:33
Jerremy Newsome: And then from a, let's just say even bigger front, right?
45:36
So we talked about the small guys.
45:38
If American businesses unite on one immigration, ask
45:43
Congress, what should it be?
45:47
Melissa Harms: I think it would be to give us a workable work visa that
45:51
captures like a point-based work visa.
45:53
I think if they could, revisit the H one B with today's economy, today's
45:59
professions, like there are a lot of professions now that do allow for a
46:03
number of different bachelor's degrees.
46:05
The bachelor's degree is a antiquated requirement in my mind.
46:09
Looking at your work visa and look at it more of a point system.
46:12
And then, the lottery, making the lottery more equitable.
46:16
People like the individual who's been through nine times, there should be some
46:19
sort of allowance given to people the more times they've gone through the lottery.
46:23
I don't know.
46:24
I think we can just really revisit the work visa at this point.
46:28
Dave Conley: So I think it was in previous episodes that we've had.
46:31
We also know that, so much of this is geared towards college
46:34
yet where we need to be doing.
46:37
Probably most of the hiring in the United States is in blue collar professions.
46:41
And by and large, the electricians, the concrete workers, the people
46:46
who are actually building.
46:48
Are from outside of this country.
46:51
So what does point-based system mean?
46:55
How does that work?
46:56
Does it say, oh, you have a bachelor's degree?
46:58
Yes.
46:59
Or you have a, high skillset.
47:01
Yes.
47:01
What does point-based mean?
47:03
Melissa Harms: I like those examples because I do think that there's points
47:06
for different occupations that we need.
47:08
We need more nurses, we need more, a simple nurse cannot get an H
47:13
one B, so we need things that accommodate non four year degrees.
47:18
So part of that point system could be based on what's the
47:21
need for that occupation.
47:23
And every year there could be some sort of indexing of where are the occupations
47:28
that are unfilled by US workers?
47:30
And those get an extra point.
47:33
So you could bring in people in, because that's another complaint I
47:36
have a lot, like maybe it's somebody that's just an exceptional, very
47:40
exceptional sales, for example.
47:42
And this person's sales, like that's probably my most common need is
47:46
that a lot of these companies, this guy's been selling for me from.
47:49
From abroad, and his sales numbers are through the roof.
47:52
I wanna bring him into the US and I'm like, no, I can't
47:54
get a visa for a sales guy.
47:55
No way.
47:56
No how so maybe past performance or income or, there's just some allowance
48:01
for a lot of different factors besides that just being your educational degrees.
48:07
Jerremy Newsome: I am sure AI could track that somewhere, Dave, easily.
48:10
It could be some relatively simple database, but again, it'd
48:13
be a good opportunity as well about built out and tracked and
48:16
measured because that'd be cool.
48:18
Kinda like the credit system, which is also totally broken,
48:20
but it's the least trackable.
48:23
People can log in and see what's going on.
48:26
Melissa Harms: I, I'm at large.
48:27
I'm not a fan of people from the outside coming in to run the government.
48:31
Thinking they know more than everybody else.
48:34
But that said, I do think there's ways you could privatize some of this, to start a
48:39
system using real world common sense about how to make the immigration system work.
48:47
Jerremy Newsome: Yeah, totally.
48:48
That's that's a huge blue ocean of opportunity in my opinion.
48:52
Just especially, and the conversation we had last podcast was about the forms
48:59
and and helping, all the documentation needs to happen for the undocumented
49:04
immigrants who are trying to come in and they just, they've already been here
49:06
for sec seven years and they feel right.
49:08
Just go through this whole process, like, how can we speed up everything
49:11
And give the ability for lawyers to, or.
49:14
Judges to just see things so much faster, articulate things, so much faster,
49:18
document things so much faster, become aware of the problem, the solutions so
49:21
much quicker, turn days into minutes using some AI scanning tools, logging tools,
49:29
metric tools, things of that nature.
49:30
Again, probably we privatize, but ultimately is just still a product that
49:34
right now would be extremely helpful.
49:37
Melissa Harms: Yeah I mean with, so my role with our National Lawyers
49:41
Association was with I was head of the government collaboration subcommittee
49:45
of the technology innovation.
49:47
And so I worked with U-S-C-I-S and some of the stupid stuff
49:51
that we're doing right now.
49:52
So we, when I file an H one B petition, I can file it online now, but if I
49:57
file an H one B work thing online, I can't use my private case management
50:03
system that I use to get all the information from these people securely.
50:07
I can't use that data and hook it up to U-S-C-I-S right now, there is no
50:12
there's no way to connect those two.
50:14
Jerremy Newsome: Crazy.
50:15
Melissa Harms: I wanna file something electronically, I have to input the
50:19
data myself or my team does, right?
50:22
So much data.
50:23
So I don't file petitions electronically.
50:25
Now, some firms have worked around this and used done their own sort of API
50:30
to make it work that USAS doesn't want them doing, but they have done that.
50:34
But USAS hasn't created APIs that we can use with our private system.
50:38
So then we have to input everything manually.
50:40
So that means I am still sending paper applications
50:43
into U-S-C-I-S, which is giant.
50:45
And the way, my team is all, we all are.
50:48
We work.
50:49
In various places around the country.
50:51
So we upload, we have PDFs, everything stored securely, and then what we
50:56
have to do is print that PDF, put it in a FedEx mailer, mail it to
51:00
USAS, and then U-S-C-I-S has a team of people scanning in our paper.
51:07
Okay?
51:08
So my question was, why can't you let us upload that PDF until you
51:15
have an API where our databases can talk, let us upload that you
51:20
get to fire all your scanners.
51:22
I get to save paper and, environmental costs of the shipping.
51:26
And they promise us that by the end of fiscal year 2024 has not happened.
51:33
Has not happened.
51:34
We cannot upload an application yet.
51:36
So that's tiny.
51:38
That's a tiny idea of how bad U-S-C-I-S is, they need to be.
51:44
U-S-C-I-S could be completely cleared out as far as I'm concerned
51:47
and start it over again, but,
51:48
Dave Conley: And it's an extraordinarily simple change, right?
51:51
Like a, a tech team could put that together in no time.
51:54
Even with archaic systems.
51:56
I know this because I did government computer work and I know how bad
52:00
those systems are, but something like accepting A PDF and then, but
52:04
because they have to scan it back into some system anyways is bonkers.
52:08
We had a guest last week that, for his wife they had to take physical photos
52:14
down to an office of their wedding to prove that they had gotten married.
52:19
And it was like I don't even know where to print photos.
52:22
What would I do?
52:23
What is this?
52:24
Melissa Harms: Yeah.
52:25
Dave Conley: it, you've been doing this for 25 years.
52:30
25 years from now, what would you say we got right?
52:35
And what would you say we got wrong?
52:38
Melissa Harms: You mean where do I see it going the next 25 years
52:41
Dave Conley: i.
52:42
Melissa Harms: Yeah.
52:43
I don't know.
52:43
I'm scared to answer that question because I think we're all very scared about the
52:47
practice of immigration law in general.
52:49
One thing, and this isn't really to the government, but we're all very
52:52
scared of what AI is gonna do to immigration law because, there's,
52:56
immigration is incredibly complex.
52:58
People think I just fill out a form and that's all I do.
53:02
But there are so many nuances to what we do.
53:04
If what we see is that kind of the dumbing down of immigration law where people are
53:08
going to be getting in trouble 'cause they're doing things through AI and
53:12
not understanding all the implications.
53:14
So that's one that's looking at more the practice of immigration law.
53:18
But then in terms of what I see, our country right now is being fed
53:23
so many, lies about immigration.
53:27
And I think what my goal is for people to get out of this is read the facts
53:32
on what immigration does for our economy, how they're not replacing us
53:35
workers, the e the economic benefits, the taxes that immigrants pay.
53:40
All of these positives about immigration, our country.
53:43
Rich history with immigration.
53:45
We are a nation of immigrants.
53:46
And the last really big amnesty program was by Ronald
53:50
Reagan, a Republican, in 1986.
53:53
And there were a lot of positives out of that 1986 amnesty including my
53:58
best friend who's now a US citizen, because she was unlawful back in 1986.
54:03
No, but there's just the, for the American people to get the truth
54:07
because I think particularly in some areas of the country people feel
54:12
like immigrants are taking away their jobs, and that's simply not the case.
54:16
And so I think that is more what I wanna shout from the rooftops
54:20
is get the facts out there.
54:21
Read about the economic benefits of immigration and how can we do this right.
54:26
Jerremy Newsome: Yeah.
54:27
And again, I think we blend both immigration challenges together in
54:31
the same bucket far too often as well, just from a media standpoint.
54:35
If you go to a county fair and start talking to people about
54:40
immigration, they think it's just people coming across the borders.
54:43
They're not even thinking about the area where you're in or the corporations
54:47
you're in, their business you're in.
54:48
We're like, Hey, we're hiring talent and it's a large number of people and we need
54:54
that talent 'cause we're growing, right?
54:55
The country's growing.
54:57
And to surmise it, for me, it really comes down to almost an abundance versus
55:02
scarcity mindset where you'll hear that in books, you'll hear that in programs or
55:06
like your random woowoo Instagram channel.
55:09
But if we really think about the abundance approach.
55:12
We're saying is there's more than enough.
55:14
There's more than enough to go around.
55:16
There's plenty.
55:17
And if we approach it from the scarcity of there's not enough, we
55:20
need to shrink, we need to close, we need to be scared, we need to
55:23
be worried, we need to be panicked.
55:24
There's not enough jobs.
55:25
AI's gonna take everything.
55:26
Everyone's gonna fight tooth to nail.
55:28
That's a scarcity mindset, right?
55:30
There isn't a post abundance, post scarcity world coming too, where
55:35
everyone has more than enough.
55:36
Everyone has opportunities like that also exists, and it's gonna require
55:40
some level of just bigger thinking.
55:42
And I really like that approach.
55:43
So where it's like, Hey, listen, this is adding to our economy
55:46
and the best way is imaginable.
55:48
That's what created this country after we settled it, in the ginormous open gate of
55:54
all the immigrations that we allowed in the late 18 hundreds, early 19 hundreds.
55:59
And that's what caused this country to become massive, incredible, just
56:02
this generous, overflowing cornucopia of the world's largest economy.
56:09
We brought everyone together and we had that abundant mindset.
56:11
We didn't fall into the scarcity, into the beliefs that there's not enough.
56:15
Melissa Harms: And that said I wouldn't go so far to say open borders, but we need
56:18
a common sense approach and we do need to think about the job market in particular,
56:22
as being, we just want it bigger.
56:25
We want it bigger and bigger.
56:26
And the more opportunities we create, the better off we are.
56:29
And so far, I would say over my 25 years, I feel like immigration has been
56:33
a limiting factor for economic growth.
56:37
Particularly, everything I've seen when I started back in 2000, it's
56:41
like everything's gotten worse.
56:42
There's nothing where I can say, oh, this has gotten so much better.
56:45
I feel like everything has gotten worse.
56:48
That's where you, when you ask me to go 25 years in the future, I'm
56:50
like, how much worse can I get?
56:53
Jerremy Newsome: Yeah.
56:53
We need to make some changes now.
56:56
We hope that this podcast will at least inspire a few
57:00
thousand people to do just that.
57:02
Not only make that change, make that shift, but be aware
57:05
create maybe new policies.
57:07
As you mentioned, take something from the private sector, bring
57:10
into the governmental sector just in case it can speed up processes.
57:13
We've used the word archaic way too much.
57:17
We shouldn't be using it this much.
57:19
It is 20, 25.
57:20
PDFs shouldn't be mailed into anything, anywhere, ever again.
57:24
especially for someone's livelihood,
57:27
Melissa Harms: Yep.
57:27
Jerremy Newsome: right?
57:28
For someone's life.
57:29
You mentioned families, children, jobs, like that's really what this is.
57:33
This is economy.
57:33
This is growing.
57:34
It does not, should not need word archaic shouldn't be here anymore.
57:40
And I just wanna motivate and encourage everyone who's here and everyone who's
57:44
listening, we have opportunities.
57:47
They're all around us.
57:48
We just have to look for them.
57:49
We have to find them.
57:50
And Melissa, thank you for sharing your wealth of knowledge, your
57:54
excitement, your details about this topic, and giving us a glimmer of not
57:59
only hope, but just also solutions.
58:02
Easy implications, easy applications that can be upgraded, updated, and
58:06
changed to make this a better, faster, quicker, more efficient process.
58:11
Melissa Harms: Thanks, Jerremy.
58:11
It was a pleasure to talk to you and Dave and I look forward to
58:15
your resolution of this crisis.
58:18
Jerremy Newsome: Thank you, Melissa.
58:19
Awesome guest.
58:20
Very informative, very smart, great talker.
58:23
Dave Conley: Yeah.
58:24
Jerremy Newsome: A lot of good content.
58:25
Was able to carry a lot of stuff for us.
58:27
You asked amazing questions.
58:29
Dave Conley: this whole thing has surprised me.
58:31
What did you learn?
58:32
Jerremy Newsome: You know the part that intrigues me.
58:35
Is that as a country of this size, we do just have such mundane processes
58:49
that I'm just trying to figure out why.
58:50
I know that's why Elon was like, listen, I'm just gonna come in, throw
58:53
a couple hundred million dollars.
58:55
I'm gonna create the Department of Government efficiency and poof, we'll
58:58
have a more effective government.
59:00
And that dude who freaking blows up rockets and was
59:03
like, nah, that's too hard.
59:05
Let's make 'em sit.
59:06
Let's make 'em come back to the same planet, the same launch launching pad.
59:11
Let's reuse a rocket over and over.
59:14
guy was like, nah, this is too tough.
59:16
Dave Conley: This,
59:16
Jerremy Newsome: Where is this?
59:18
Dave Conley: The guy who builds all of these incredible businesses
59:21
launches things into space like an actual rocket scientist built brand
59:25
new cars, tunnels under the ground.
59:27
The government broke him.
59:29
Jerremy Newsome: Yeah,
59:30
Dave Conley: yeah,
59:30
Jerremy Newsome: in three months.
59:32
And yeah, man, I'm just like that.
59:34
Why are we doing it in such a backend?
59:37
1947, our girl, Melissa's a 25-year-old top tier attorney for huge, mega
59:46
businesses and is mailing in documentation that her team is running down by hand
59:53
because she needs to get people's visas so they can have jobs, so they can
59:57
support their family, so they can spend.
59:59
Thousands of dollars a year on these stupid taxes that we're probably just
1:00:03
throwing away at people for no reason.
1:00:05
That's what I'm learning, man.
1:00:06
I'm excited to fix and update a lot of these challenges and problems
1:00:09
because I know it's possible.
1:00:11
I know it's doable and it's just connecting with, I love that she
1:00:13
said the word, the private market.
1:00:15
I am on the exact opposite end of that discussion where I think the
1:00:19
privatized sector is where we've probably fixed most of the government.
1:00:22
And I don't believe that the government shouldn't be people that
1:00:26
are not probably a double negative.
1:00:28
They should be filled with people who did come from the private
1:00:31
sector, who just were citizens.
1:00:33
We're like, Hey, I've done some really cool things.
1:00:35
Now my money's figured out.
1:00:36
For the most part, I'm not gonna take a bunch of money from other
1:00:39
countries or corporations or companies to make my lifestyle better.
1:00:43
'cause that's obviously illegal and I shouldn't be doing that.
1:00:45
So I'm just gonna be a public servant and just make this stuff
1:00:48
run better and quicker, efficient.
1:00:49
My job is to literally sit down and figure how to solve this problem
1:00:54
within this domain that I'm focused on.
1:00:57
I do not think that immigration should be as federally overwhelming as it is.
1:01:01
I think I've mentioned that before.
1:01:02
I think there should be other departments, other governments, other
1:01:04
efficiencies that should also be handling that where it's not the deporter in
1:01:08
chief, Obama, or it's not Trump who are like, this is not the way it is.
1:01:14
And now I have the 16th largest military in the world ICE all this.
1:01:19
And we're not spending time to make it quicker, more
1:01:21
efficient and less militaristic.
1:01:24
And that just seems weird to me.
1:01:25
And this is a very fascinating topic.
1:01:27
And again, it is one of the ones to me and many of them have been for sure.
1:01:31
But this is one where I'm like, wow.
1:01:33
Wow.
1:01:33
We wow.
1:01:34
It affects so many people, so blatantly every single day.
1:01:38
yes, education and my main component does affect people daily, but it's
1:01:44
also gonna be something that's gonna be longer term effects, right?
1:01:48
Like when you study.
1:01:49
Taxes and we study the stock market.
1:01:51
When we study money and we study finance and we study health, those are effects
1:01:54
that do prolong themselves, right?
1:01:56
They take weeks, months, maybe even years, but this is one that's been affecting
1:02:01
people for decades and will continue to affect people for decades, but affects
1:02:04
people in everyday life right now, on a big scale, no one is seemingly doing
1:02:10
anything about it, and it's quite wild.
1:02:12
That's what I learned.
1:02:14
Hand it over.
1:02:16
Dave Conley: Okay.
1:02:16
What did I learn?
1:02:17
I learned that we spend all of our time talking about illegal and
1:02:22
alligator alley and deportations and all of the money goes to that.
1:02:27
Yet this topic, legal, immigration, people wanting jobs.
1:02:31
This should be the number one discussion point when it comes to immigration.
1:02:36
it's fear mongering.
1:02:38
in comparison to this.
1:02:39
These are people who are building the economy, building the next stuff, building
1:02:43
the things that we need in this country.
1:02:45
Pathways to citizenship, pathways to, blue collar jobs and the people
1:02:50
who we need to build this country.
1:02:54
I think that this legal immigration thing needs to be the number one
1:02:57
thing that we're talking about.
1:02:59
And in a way, I think that solves the undocumented
1:03:04
All of these people are here for a lot of different reasons, but
1:03:07
primarily, we've learned that a lot of it's economically driven.
1:03:11
you want to be in the United States.
1:03:12
These are the people who are building our homes and building our
1:03:16
Jerremy Newsome: Yep.
1:03:17
Dave Conley: and harvesting food and all those things.
1:03:19
And so the, this discussion needs to be about.
1:03:23
Jobs and business and economics and what's right for America.
1:03:27
And I think that solves the illegal immigration part of this.
1:03:30
So I think that we are focused on the wrong things.
1:03:34
the second thing I learned is I think states should be pretty involved.
1:03:40
Jerremy Newsome: Yeah, dude.
1:03:41
Like
1:03:43
Over here.
1:03:44
So I asked a question and after I asked, I was like, am I an idiot?
1:03:47
Dave Conley: I
1:03:47
Jerremy Newsome: for asking that question?
1:03:48
'cause she's right.
1:03:49
Dave Conley: bonkers.
1:03:50
Jerremy Newsome: federal, but there's no one going into the federal government
1:03:54
from an immigration standpoint.
1:03:55
It's a hundred percent states that get affected.
1:03:57
That's it.
1:03:58
Who else?
1:03:59
Dave Conley: And it's different for.
1:04:01
Jerremy Newsome: Each state.
1:04:02
Dave Conley: states like Arizona, Texas Florida, California.
1:04:07
There's different needs, different aspects to this.
1:04:10
Like why aren't states sponsoring these H one visas or they have their own visa?
1:04:15
It's okay, yeah, but you gotta work in California.
1:04:17
Oh, boohoo.
1:04:18
I think would be even more valuable is rural, we've talked about this
1:04:23
with housing, like rural community sponsoring people to be like,
1:04:27
come on in, we got plenty of land.
1:04:28
Jerremy Newsome: Yep.
1:04:29
Dave Conley: jobs to fill.
1:04:30
It's come on.
1:04:31
We welcome you, rather than the whole eating our dogs, eating the cats thing.
1:04:34
It's no, come to America and work in our rural hospitals and work in
1:04:38
our, I think states should be deeply involved and there's a disproportionate
1:04:43
impact for states like Texas.
1:04:45
So they're gonna have different, they're gonna have different.
1:04:48
Problems too.
1:04:50
And Texas has different problems than Florida, even though we both
1:04:52
have a high immigrant population, so states need to be involved.
1:04:57
And then the last part on the solution thing is that this thing hasn't really
1:05:03
substantively been touched since 1965, and then again in the eighties and a little
1:05:09
bit, under DACA with President Obama.
1:05:12
This thing is a patchwork of mess, mainly designed by special interest,
1:05:18
probably, like being very protectionist and they don't know what left
1:05:22
hand is affecting the right hand.
1:05:24
So that's created this Byzantine thing.
1:05:26
And politicians, which we've said over and over again, know nothing about this.
1:05:31
And the people that do know it.
1:05:34
Need to be designing these systems.
1:05:35
Those are business people and those are the immigrants themselves.
1:05:39
And we get those two groups together in a public private partnership
1:05:43
with saying, okay, are the things that we need to build in America.
1:05:46
These are the social aspects of this, and these are the immigrants
1:05:49
and immigrant experiences.
1:05:51
We'd have a really sane immigration plan.
1:05:54
We talked about like the points-based system.
1:05:56
Like I am sure that a sane immigration plan that isn't open to all the borders
1:06:01
and isn't nobody comes in, come out of this because what we have now is, again,
1:06:07
medieval, we're gonna keep saying that.
1:06:10
Jerremy Newsome: Team, if this is firing you up as much as it is myself
1:06:13
and Dave Conley, let just promote this episode, promote this entire podcast.
1:06:18
Do what you can, and hit us with those five star reviews.
1:06:20
Listen, if you've got a 14-year-old son that has a phone, take it from him.
1:06:25
up the podcast, click that five star review, write a quick review.
1:06:28
The more reviews, the more stars that we get, the more people that will listen.
1:06:32
The bigger the audience.
1:06:33
The bigger the audience, the more solutions that we will not only
1:06:36
think about, know about, hear about, but we will be able to create.
1:06:39
You can find us, solve USA Pod on X or solving America's
1:06:43
Problems podcast Instagram.
1:06:46
We are gonna still be here.
1:06:47
We're gonna continue to pour into you.
1:06:49
Thank you so much for being a listener.
1:06:50
You rock.