H-2B Guestworker Program
The H-2B Guestworker Program
September 2011 Update on H-2B program developments
The H-2B temporary foreign worker program allows employers to hire workers from other countries on temporary work permits to fill nonagricultural jobs that last less than one year. H-2B workers are commonly found in the landscaping, forestry, seafood processing, and hospitality industries.
Unlike the H-2A agricultural guestworker program, which has no limits on the number of H-2A workers who can be brought into the US, there are numerical limits on the number of work visas that can be issued under the H-2B program. The 2006 cap on H-2B workers is 66,000. In response to employer complaints that the cap on H-2B workers is too low, in 2005, Congress passed the Save Our Small and Seasonal Business Act. This Act temporarily exempted H-2B workers who have worked under the program in the last three years from counting toward the 66,000 cap.
Employers have tried to pass similar legislation in subsequent years but have been unsuccessful.
Resources, more information on the H-2B guestworker program
In July 2010 American University's Washington College of Law and the Centro de los derechos del Migrante (Center for Migrant Rights) released a report on the lives of H-2B guestworkers (mostly women) in the Maryland crab industry. It is an excellent resource with lots of detailed information about housing conditions, common workplace injuries and sexual harrassment. It also has a lot of information on illegal recruitment fees the workers pay for the visa in their home countries. Download the report: Picked Apart: The Hidden Struggles of Migrant Worker Women in the Maryland Crab Industry 
.
The abuse and exploitation of H-2B forestry workers has been extensively documented by Tom Knudson and Hector Amezcua of the Sacramento Bee in a series of articles documenting the life of H-2B forestry workers in the US. Check out the award-winning Piñeros: Men of the Pines.
The Southern Poverty Law Center's Immigrant Justice Project is representing forestry workers in several cases against timber companies who have violated labor and wage provisions. For information about these cases, please see this SPLC News Page. SPLC also has a booklet, Beneath the Pines, telling the stories of migrant pine tree workers.
Access to legal representation
The Northwest Workers' Justice Project and the Brennan Center for Justice filed a complaint under the labor side agreement to the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) seeking access to justice for H-2B guestworkers. Read the history of that complaint here.
