AMERICA's H-1B visa system has come under renewed scrutiny after US economist and former Representative Dave Brat claimed that visa approvals had exceeded statutory limits.
Brat said on Steve Bannon’s War Room podcast that although the annual cap is 85,000, Chennai alone accounted for 220,000 H-1B approvals.
Brat said the programme had been “captured by industrial-scale fraud” and pointed to the nationality breakdown.
“Seventy-one per cent of H-1B visas come from India, and only 12 per cent come from China, which is the second largest group. That tells you something’s going on right there,” he said.
He added: “Then there’s a cap of only 85,000 H-1B visas, but somehow one district in India, the Madras (Chennai) district, got 220,000, two and a half times the cap Congress has set.”
He linked the alleged issues to the Make America Great Again movement’s concerns about immigration, saying: “When I say H-1B visa, you need to think of your cousins, your aunts and uncles, and your grandparents. One of these folks comes over and claims they’re skilled; they’re not. That’s the fraud.”
Brat’s remarks follow earlier claims by Mahvash Siddiqui, an Indian-American diplomat, reported The Business Standard.
She said that US officials processed thousands of non-immigrant visas in 2024, including 220,000 H-1Bs and 140,000 H-4s, and alleged widespread fraud involving fake documents, proxy applicants and coaching centres in Hyderabad.
