Microsoft's Brad Smith rejects JD Vance's visa fraud accusations

The company president says visa and green-card numbers were misstated and that Microsoft hired 9,200 American workers last fiscal year.

By West Coast News staff · October 16, 2026

Building 92 on Microsoft's Redmond campus.

Microsoft President Brad Smith told Politico that Vice President JD Vance's claim Microsoft replaced laid-off Americans with foreign workers was "completely off base," GeekWire reported on Thursday.

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Vance had said Microsoft laid off 6,000 American workers last year while receiving 6,300 H-1B visas and nearly 3,000 green cards. Smith said someone "failed to inform the vice president accurately about our numbers" before the administration cut off Microsoft's ability to sponsor foreign workers for permanent residency through the Labor Department's PERM program.

Smith said most recent visa and green-card applications were for people already working at Microsoft, many for years because of green-card backlogs, and that the company hired 9,200 American workers in its last fiscal year. He also said visa holders and American workers share the same compensation system.

The suspension does not block H-1B hiring. Amazon led new H-1B approvals for fiscal 2025 with 4,644, followed by Meta with 1,555 and Microsoft with 1,394, according to an analysis cited by GeekWire.