The US Department of Justice announced that it has reached a settlement agreement with Amtex Systems Inc., an IT staffing and recruiting company based in New York. The settlement resolves claims that Amtex discriminated against US workers based on their citizenship or immigration status during several stages of the recruitment process because its clients preferred workers with temporary employment visas, according to the department.
Under the terms of the settlement agreement, Amtex will pay over $15,000 in civil penalties to the US, revise its policies and procedures, train relevant employees and agents on the Immigration and Nationality Act’s anti-discrimination provision, and be subject to monitoring for a three-year period to ensure compliance.
The department’s investigation began after a US citizen filed a discrimination complaint with the Civil Rights Division’s Immigrant and Employee Rights Section against Amtex. Based on its investigation, the department concluded that Amtex used a company operating in India to identify and screen job applicants based on clients’ preferences for workers with particular citizenship or immigration statuses. The investigation determined that the recruiters sent job advertisements with their clients’ unlawful citizenship or immigration status preferences and also implemented those preferences when considering applicants, according to the Department of Justice.
The investigation allegedly found that Amtex did not consider at least three US workers when they applied to a job posting that stated a preference for workers with temporary employment visas. Additionally, the department concluded that recruiters for Amtex discriminated against non-US citizen applicants by routinely requiring them to provide an immigration document to move forward in the recruitment process.
“IT staffing agencies cannot unlawfully exclude applicants or impose additional burdens because of someone’s citizenship or immigration status,” said Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. “The Civil Rights Division is committed to enforcing the law to ensure that job applicants, including US workers, are protected from unlawful discrimination.”