Green Card Blocked: Locals Sabotaging H1B Jobs?

An H-1B techie just met with a shocker from his US firm, and it’s not because he lacked skills, but because of a flood of possibly fake job applications.

The H-1B visa holder shared his story online. He is in his second year of working as an AI/ML Engineer at a FinTech company. His employer was supposed to sponsor his green card under the “Data Scientist II” role, the same title he was hired for in 2022.

However, earlier this month, the immigration team abruptly paused the PERM labour market test as over 400 people applied. No interview was conducted before the sudden pause because the company believed that too many applicants could trigger an audit.

The techie admits the job description was vague and didn’t reflect his actual work. He’s since been promoted to AI/ML Engineer III, and the company now wants to start the process all over again.

However, what this case highlighted was that this sudden onslaught of applicants might not even be real.

Another user pointed out that an account on X is actively encouraging people to spam PERM listings. They even bragged about this exact scenario, celebrating posts where companies received hundreds of applications and backed out.

Some online are openly admitting to applying to PERM jobs they’re not remotely qualified for, just to sabotage H-1B green card processes.

Local citizens are weaponizing a system which is already skewed against immigrants just to push them out. There is no legal trouble for anyone who is applying for these jobs. But for an H-1B techie chasing a secure future in the US, he pays a heavy price.