STEM Jobs Act of 2012

Floor Speech

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Ms. CHU. I rise today in opposition to this bill which will further damage our already broken immigration system. I strongly support increasing visas for STEM foreign students so they can stay, work, and innovate here. But while this bill claims to do that, it actually reduces the number of overall visas available and lets unused STEM visas disappear by 2014.

The bill also gets rid of 50,000 legal immigrant visas each year under the Diversity Visa Program, which gives every immigrant, no matter their background, a chance of immigrating to the United States and is so important to immigrants who don't fall into other categories.

Supporters of legal immigration should not have to kill other immigration programs to help our economy maintain its competitive edge. This is not a zero-sum game.

Anyone in support of fair legal immigration should oppose this bill. And I urge both sides to come together to work on a bipartisan STEM visa bill that will help keep our economy competitive without making our backlogged immigration system worse.

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