Dear President H. W. Bush and Senator Ted Kennedy,
I am writing as a recent STEM graduate who finished at the top of my class in 2026.
I did everything that was asked of me. High grades. Strong projects. Internships when I could get them. That was the path promised to the few who could finish the coursework. I believed the degree would open doors.
It has not.
I have gone through interview after interview with no offer. At the same time, many of the foreign students I studied alongside already had jobs waiting before they graduated. Some received offers in their junior year. I am still sending applications and getting short rejections or silence.
You both helped create the H-1B program in 1990. The promise was temporary skill gaps and the best talent. That is not what I am seeing.
What I am seeing is a system that prefers workers who arrive with sponsorship already arranged while American graduates who trained here compete for fewer open seats. The shortage never closed. The openings for people like me only got tighter.
You will never sit where I sit. Classmates from other countries move into roles while I keep hearing the market is competitive.
Was this the plan from the start, or were you too ignorant to see what it would become?
The harm is personal. It lands on students who did the work and still cannot find a place in the profession they prepared for.
That is the part of the promise that did not come true.
Sincerely,
A top graduate still looking for work in my field