A US federal district court has issued an order temporarily blocking the implementation of an executive order, which restricted visas for skilled workers and their families, on the ground that the order “exceeded Presidential authority by imposing the immigration restrictions.”

The present litigation arose from an executive order of June this year, which temporarily suspended issuance of work visas and barred foreigners from seeking employment in the United States for a wide variety of jobs, including computer programmers, seasonal employees on guest-worker visas, workers in the hospitality industry, individual who enter the US on cultural exchange visas, students on work-study summer programs, and other high skilled workers.

In his ruling, Judge Jeffrey S. White of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, opined that “Congress’ delegation of authority in the immigration context does not afford the President unbridled authority to set domestic policy regarding employment of nonimmigrant foreigners.”

The implication of this ruling is that US based major technology companies like  Google, Facebook, Apple, and Amazon and other companies that had hitherto largely relied on foreign workers to fill highly skilled positions  can now resume bringing employees from abroad.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-10-01/trump-blocked-from-restricting-visas-used-by-high-skill-workers?srnd=politics-vp

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