3 Trump properties posted 144 openings for

seasonal jobs. Only one went to a US worker.

“America First” doesn’t seem to apply to the president’s own businesses.

By Alexia Fernández Campbell - Feb 13, 2018, 9:00 am EST

President Donald Trump's businesses don’t seem too concerned about “America
First."
A Vox analysis of hiring records for seasonal workers at three Trump properties in
New York and Florida revealed that only one out of 144 jobs went to a US worker
from 2016 to the end of 2017. Foreign guest workers with H-2B visas got the rest.
Javier Zarracina/Vox
The H-2B visa program allows seasonal, non-agricultural employers — like hotels
and ski resorts — to hire foreign workers when they can’t find American ones. The
Trump administration
temporarily expanded this guest-worker program in 2017 while restricting other
avenues of legal immigration, including the H-1B program for high-skilled
workers.

The Trump Organization is exactly the kind of company that relies on the H-2B
visa program for low-skilled workers.
Vox reviewed recruiting files submitted to the US Department of Labor for
two Trump properties in Florida (including Mar-a-Lago) and one in New York from
the start of 2016 through the end of 2017. In that period, hiring managers said
they were able to find and hire only one qualified American worker — a cook —
for 144 open positions for servers, cooks, housekeepers, and bartenders.

Ivana Trump and Eric Trump attend an event at Trump National Golf Club
Westchester in Briarcliff Manor, New York, in 2015.Grant Lamos IV/Getty Images
A review of properties listed in a 2016 Business Insider report indicates Trump
owns 17 major hotels and clubs in the US. A search of the Department of Labor
database revealed three that applied for H-2B visas in 2016 and 2017.

Under the H-2B program, employers must first try to hire American workers — or
legal immigrants already in the United States — at reasonable wages for their
openings. If they can’t find qualified US workers, then employers can ask the
Department of Labor for permission to hire foreign guest workers on H-2B visas.
Documents show that hiring managers at the Trump establishments made the
minimum efforts required by law to recruit US workers.

While many businesses may truly struggle to find local workers and rely on
foreign workers to fill slots, the hiring practices at Trump's properties certainly are
out of step with his “America First” rhetoric and policies.

“If the president says ‘hire American,’ then the president’s businesses should hire
American,” said Bruce Morrison, a Democrat and former Congress member from
Connecticut who helped write the Immigration Act of 1990, which placed limits
on the H-2B visa program.

Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, which
advocates for immigration restrictions, said he was “displeased” when Trump
temporarily expanded the H-2B program in 2017. He said Mar-a-Lago is just using
the program how other employers use it: as a way to avoid paying higher wages
or offering more benefits to attract American workers.

“It’s a bullshit law written to ensure that employers don’t have to hire
Americans,” said Krikorian, who normally applauds the president’s immigration
agenda.
Mar-a-Lago hired dozens of foreign workers in 2017
Unemployment in the Miami area has been low in 2016 and 2017 (4.5 percent as
of December 2017), and it’s harder for employers in South Florida to find workers
now than a few years ago. But Vox spoke to several labor economists in the state
who were nonetheless puzzled that hotels or clubs would have such a hard time
finding any service workers to hire.
“It doesn’t make sense,” said Tobias Pfutze, an economics professor at Florida
International University in Miami. “I haven't heard anything about there being a
labor shortage. The service labor market here is very flexible.”

In August 2017 alone, Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach (Trump’s “winter White House”)
sought permission to hire 70 servers, housekeepers, and cooks for eight months
starting in October, according to recruitment reports submitted to the
Department of Labor. In the paperwork, the club’s hiring manager explained the
reason the club needed to hire temporary workers:
Our temporary need is defined as a peak-load need and stems from the fact that
The Mar-a-Lago Club operates in accordance with a private charter and is open to
the membership throughout the year but with a well defined peak season
between the months of October and May of every year. The period during which
the foreign national’s services are needed is not unpredictable, subject to change
or considered to be a vacation period for our employees who are hired on a
permanent basis.
Based on the paperwork submitted, the hiring manager fulfilled the minimum
effort required by law to try to find American workers first: place an ad in the
local newspaper for two days, notify past employees of the openings via US mail,
and post the job notice in a visible place at the club for current employees to see.
Employers are required to pay the average local wage for the advertised position.
Mar-a-Lago offered $10.33 per hour for housekeepers, $13.43 for cooks, and
$11.88 for servers (no tips).

After waiting the required month, the hiring manager at Mar-a-Lago reported that
only seven US workers responded to the newspaper job ads, and that they were
either unqualified, uninterested, or did not return calls.
President Trump's one-year anniversary was celebrated with more than 800
guests at the winter White House at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida, on
January 18, 2018. Patrick McMullan/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images
That was also the case with other Trump properties. In April 2017, the DOL
allowed Trump National Golf Club in Briarcliff Manor, New York, to hire all eight of
the H-2B servers that the club requested. The hiring manager said no US workers
applied for the job.

In August that year, the DOL allowed Trump National Golf Club in Jupiter, Florida,
to hire all 16 of the requested H-2B servers and cooks. Again, the hiring manager
reported that no US workers applied for the job. In all, of the 12 US workers who
did apply for some of the 144 positions advertised across the three properties
from 2016 to mid-2017, only one was hired.
Javier Zarracina/Vox
It’s unclear if the Department of Labor verifies such claims. A spokesperson for
the agency told Vox he would inquire about the details of the process, but did not
follow up. He did not respond to another request for information.
The Trump administration has expanded the H-2B program
In the past five years, a few of Trump’s golf clubs and resorts on the East Coast
have relied heavily on hiring foreign workers to serve patrons during the summer
months (in New York) and the winter months (in Florida). The H-
2B database shows requests from Mar-a-Lago dating back to 2013. This practice
has clearly not stopped since Trump became president.

In fact, the Trump administration temporarily expanded the H-2B program. In July
2017, the Department of Homeland Security raised the cap on H-2B visas for
guest workers from 66,000 to 81,000 for fiscal year 2017. (Three days later,
Trump's properties asked for permission to hire 76 workers through the
program.)

The policy change was surprising. Trump has criticized other guest-worker
programs for supposedly taking jobs away from Americans. He has resisted calls
from the tech industry to expand the H-1B visa for high-skilled workers. He hasn’t
increased visas in the H-2A program for seasonal farmworkers, even though the
agriculture industry has lobbied for it. He even delayed the launch of a startup
visa program that Obama created to help foreign tech entrepreneurs start
businesses in the United States (though a federal judge in December ruled that
the administration did not have legal standing to do so).

The Department of Homeland Security said at the time that the visa cap was lifted
to help American companies “suffering irreparable harm” because they can't find
enough American workers to fill temporary jobs at hotels, ski resorts, and
landscaping companies.
Controversy over the H-2B program
Congress created the H-2 guest-worker program in 1952 and then split it up into
two separate programs in 1986: the H-2A visa for temporary farmworkers, and
the H-2B visa for low-skilled workers in seasonal industries.
For years, few employers used the H-2B program, and applications rarely
exceeded the 66,000 annual visa limit. By 2000, businesses had grown more
comfortable with the process and competition for the visas grew more intense.
Most of the workers brought to the United States on these temporary visas have
few skills and come from poor countries. In 2014, most H-2B workers came from
Mexico, with Jamaica and Guatemala sending many as well. Employers in Texas
hired the most.

The H-2B program — like other guest-worker programs — has long drawn the ire
of organized labor. Business groups, like the US Chamber of Commerce, have
repeatedly told Congress that there aren’t enough Americans willing to take
temporary jobs at amusement parks, ski resorts, and hotels.
But union leaders say that’s just not true, and they accuse companies of trying to
save money on labor costs by exploiting cheap foreign workers at the expense of
Americans.

The process of hiring an H-2B worker isn’t easy. First, an employer has to ask the
Department of Labor to calculate the most common wage for that particular job
in a particular location. After getting a response a few weeks later, employers
have to send a work order to the state’s workforce agency, detailing the position
the business is looking to fill, the qualifications required, and the prevailing wage.

The next required step is to advertise the job in a local newspaper and hire all
qualified applicants. Once the Department of Labor gives an employer permission
to bring in temporary workers, they have to apply for the workers’ H-2B visas
through US Citizenship and Immigration Services. Potential workers then have to
meet with staff from the US Department of State at the closest American
consulate in their home countries. They must also pass a criminal background
check.
The process is so cumbersome that many US businesses hire a staffing company
to do the work for them. Trump properties usually hire the Petrina Group, an
international staffing agency with offices in New York.

Despite the lengthy process, interest in hiring workers through this program has
skyrocketed.

The Department of Labor says it’s swamped with applications from businesses
that want to hire guest workers for the summer. By January 1, the department
had received requests to hire 81,008 H-2B workers for the summer season. That
number of applications far exceeds the program cap of 33,000 H-2B visas
available for the season, which starts April 1.

The department will issue H-2B certifications on a first-come, first-served basis,

though the ”overwhelming workload” this year has delayed the entire process.
Posted by Thavam