US suspends eight IT and software firms from PERM green card filings

US suspends eight IT and software firms from PERM green card filings

8 October 2026: The US Department of Labor has suspended Cognizant, Infosys, Tata, Wipro, HCL, Capgemini, Microsoft and Adobe from the Permanent Labor Certification programme, the step an employer must clear before sponsoring a foreign worker for a green card. Labor Secretary Keith Sonderling announced it on Thursday with Vice President JD Vance, who heads the administration's Anti-Fraud Task Force, at his side.

Not yet independently verified. The Department of Labor's own notice was not readable when we checked (its site refused our request), so the details rest on three news reports that agree. How long the suspensions last and whether they cover applications already filed are not stated. We will update this when it can be confirmed, and remove this note.

Sonderling described the first six names as "some of the largest IT outsourcing firms in the world". He said Microsoft and Adobe were being suspended "due to multiple active federal investigations". The reports we read do not say how long the suspensions last, whether they cover applications already filed, or what an affected employer must do to be reinstated.

PERM is the process in which an employer asks the Department of Labor to certify that it tested the US labour market and could not find a qualified, willing US worker for the job. It is generally part of the route to a green card for a sponsored foreign worker, so a suspension stops sponsorship at the labour certification stage, before any immigration filing.

Vance used the event to attack the H-1B visa system more broadly, calling it "rife with fraud" and singling out Microsoft. By his account, Microsoft laid off 6,000 American workers in 2025 after certifying it could not find qualified US staff, while being approved for more than 6,000 H-1B visas and filing 3,682 PERM applications. He said nearly 1,000 of those applications were for the same positions as the laid-off workers. These are the Vice President's figures; Microsoft's response was not in the coverage we read.

The action reaches two product companies that most buyers think of as software vendors, not staffing firms, alongside the outsourcers. A company that uses one of the named firms as a delivery partner may want to ask how a pause on green card sponsorship affects the people assigned to its contract. Any employer running its own PERM cases has reason to confirm that its recruitment evidence for each role would stand up to a federal review, since the announcement ties the suspensions to fraud investigations.

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• Fifteen employment rule changes in nine countries this autumn
• Indonesia moves foreign-worker KITAS permits to the investment ministry

Sources

• The Hindu (PTI): Cognizant, Infosys, Tata, Wipro and HCL among IT firms suspended from U.S. green card programme, 8 October 2026
• Business Today: US targets Infosys, TCS, Wipro, HCL over labour programme as Vance attacks H-1B system, 8 October 2026
• TechCrunch: US bars Microsoft, Adobe, and major IT firms from green card program for skilled foreign workers, 8 October 2026