Law360: Judge OKs Work Permits For Highly Skilled Workers’ Spouses

March 31, 2023

By Alyssa Aquino

A Washington, D.C., federal judge upheld an Obama-era policy allowing employment authorization documents for spouses of highly skilled foreign workers, saying the U.S. Department of Homeland Security had reasonably considered the effects of letting that group work.

U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan said Tuesday that DHS had offered work permits for a subset of H-4 visa holders to keep their spouses, all of whom entered the U.S. on H-1B visas for workers with highly-specialized knowledge, in the U.S. labor market. DHS found that retaining those H-1B workers justified allowing their partners into the U.S. economy and further explained that the spouses would have negligible effects on U.S. workers, the judge said, rejecting claims that the policy was arbitrary and capricious.

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