97 Tech Companies Including Apple, Google, Microsoft Call Travel Ban Unlawful In Rare Coordinated Legal Action (washingtonpost.com)

An anonymous reader shares a WashingtonPost report: Silicon Valley is stepping up its confrontation with the Trump administration. On Sunday night, technology giants Apple, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Netflix, Twitter, Uber and many others filed a legal brief opposing the administration's contentious entry ban. The move represents a rare coordinated action across a broad swath of the industry (Editor's note: the link could be paywalled; alternate source) -- 97 companies in total -- and demonstrates the depth of animosity toward the Trump ban. The amicus brief was filed with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit, which is expected to rule within a few days on an appeal by the administration after a federal judge in Seattle issued late Friday a temporary restraining order putting the entry ban on hold. The brief comes at the end of a week of nationwide protests against the plan -- as well as a flurry of activity in Silicon Valley, a region that sees immigration as central to its identity as an innovation hub.From a TechCrunch report: Notably absent from the list of 97 companies are several who met with Trump prior to his inauguration: Amazon, Oracle, IBM, SpaceX and Tesla. Although Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos was highly critical of Trump prior to his election, he has not spoken out against the immigration policy. Oracle CEO Safra Catz is serving as an advisor to the Trump transition team, while SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk has defended his decision to remain on an advisory council for Trump.

Comments

Re:Interesting

[Kierthos]

I would point out that a bunch of these Republican politicians are also pro-life up to the point where the kid is born, then they can't cut social services that might help the newborn fast enough.

Re:Cheap

[AthanasiusKircher]

not because Trump is about to take away their cheap slave-labor pool and make them hire American workers.

You obviously have a point that many of these companies have an interest in getting cheaper workers, but I really wish you'd tone down the rhetoric of "slave labor." Slaves, typically, aren't paid at all. Yes, employers can be more abusive toward H1B workers, and that's a real problem, but "slave labor" is just hyperbole.

You want to talk about immigration and "slave labor"? Look toward what could happen under the Trump presidency and farm workers like pickers. Those are people who frequently work 12-16 hour days in fields, frequently in 100-degree weather. And get paid something like $10/hour (for SKILLED workers). Stats usually say that half of the U.S. farm labor force is illegal, and 3/4 of it is composed of immigrants -- because Americans simply refuse to work these jobs for that pay. There are actually other issues too -- because many of these jobs are really "skilled labor" in the sense that it can take a few years of picking a specific crop to get really good and fast at it, and these workers generally get paid per volume picked.

Not to go too off-topic here, but the U.S. is going to have to deal with some harsh realities if Trump actually tries to follow through with his immigration threats against Mexicans and Latin Americans. A number of states tried placing harsh restrictions on immigrants a few years ago, and farm owners ended up with worker shortages and crops that rotted on the fields. Without immigrants, we're looking at a future of either food shortages or significantly higher food prices... or both.

Anyhow, if you want to talk about "slave labor," there are plenty of jobs Americans get immigrants to do in much harsher conditions with backbreaking work often at significantly lower wages than any tech workers. I'm not saying tech workers aren't exploited too -- but the grand scheme of things, it's not "slave labor."