New white paper highlights portability as an employment-based immigration solution where workers, employers, and policymakers across the political spectrum can find agreement

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ITHACA, N.Y. — Cornell Law School’s Migration and Human Rights Program (MHRP) has released a new white paper, Mobility Matters: Why Worker Portability Should Drive Reform of Employment-Based Visas, arguing that improving workers’ ability to change employers should be a central consideration in efforts to reform temporary employment-based immigration.

Developed over the course of a year by many of the Program’s Immigration Law and Policy Fellows, the paper reflects rare consensus among experts with backgrounds spanning federal administrations or congressional offices of both parties, business, labor, academia, and immigrant rights advocacy. Rather than proposing comprehensive immigration reform, the white paper advances a targeted set of recommendations designed to strengthen employers’ access to talent, improve worker protections, and make the employment-based immigration system more responsive to the modern labor market.

“The Mobility Matters report represents a year of intense discussions among many Fellows of the Cornell Migration and Human Rights Program who bring unparalleled depth of experience in U.S. immigration law and policy,” said Beth Lyon, Clinical Professor of Law and co-director of the Program. “It offers a targeted, politically feasible set of reforms that could appeal across the ideological spectrum while benefiting workers, employers, and the broader economy.”

The paper focuses on a question that has received comparatively little sustained attention in immigration policy: whether workers admitted through temporary employment-based visa programs, and in particular the H-1B, H-2B and H-2A programs, should be able to move between qualifying employers more easily.

“Whether your priority is protecting workers’ rights, helping employers attract and retain talent, or strengthening the economy through innovation, portability is an underlying issue that should be part of any conversation about the future of employment-based immigration reform,” said Amy Nice, an Immigration Law and Policy Fellow.

Nice said that when a worker’s immigration status is closely tied to a single employer, perverse incentives can result. “Greater portability would address a longstanding imbalance in the employment-based immigration system by giving workers greater agency and allowing the labor market to function more effectively,” Nice said.

Although portability has appeared in limited contexts within immigration law, Fellows note worker mobility has not yet been fully considered as a foundation for updating the employment-based visa system.

“The Fellows have shown that worker mobility can serve the interests of both migrant workers and employers, while contributing to a more effective immigration system that better serves the national interest,” said Ian Kysel, Clinical Professor of Law, a co-director of the program and co-principal investigator on the Program’s Migrant Rights Database project. “This approach also reflects a broader global trend, as most major migrant-hosting countries provide at least some migrants with the ability to change employers.”

Throughout the drafting process, participants worked to identify recommendations capable of attracting support from constituencies that often disagree on immigration policy. The resulting white paper reflects an exercise in consensus-building, bringing together diverse perspectives while focusing on practical reforms where meaningful agreement is possible.

Rather than presenting a legislative blueprint, the Fellows hope the report will serve as an anchor for broader conversations about immigration reform, even in today’s political climate.

“We believe this approach can help bridge longstanding differences between employers and labor unions over temporary visas and create a more effective employment-based immigration system,” said Theresa Cardinal Brown, an Immigration Law and Policy Fellow. “While the immigration debate may appear stalled, there is bipartisan interest in finding a path forward, and this effort is designed to help.”

To read the full white paper, Mobility Matters: Why Worker Portability Should Drive Reform of Employment-Based Visas, click the link here.

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About Cornell Law School’s Migration & Human Rights Program

The Migration & Human Rights Program at Cornell Law School advances impactful, nonpartisan policy solutions grounded in research, practice, and community engagement. Through its blend of high-level policy expertise, grassroots clinical work, and interdisciplinary scholarship, the program serves as a laboratory where theory and practice inform one another in real time. The program is a joint initiative of Cornell Law School and the Brooks School of Public Policy.

Media Contact: Gretchen Hanson — grh76@cornell.edu