Manufacturer can't limit employment opportunities to U.S. citizens

A recent settlement between the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and a rocket and missile propulsion manufacturer serves as a useful reminder of the scope and purpose of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 (INA) and the authority of the department's Immigrant and Employee Rights (IER) section.

Overview of the INA

The federal INA was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson. It abolished the National Origins Formula, which had been the basis of U.S. immigration policy since the 1920s.

The National Origins Formula was a system of quotas, used from 1921 to 1965, that restricted immigration based on existing proportions of the population. It aimed to reduce the overall number of unskilled immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe and Asia to allow families to reunite but prevent immigration from changing the ethnic distribution of the population of Americans of Northern and Western European descent. During the 1960s, at the height of the Civil Rights Movement, the approach increasingly came under attack for being racially discriminatory.

One of the INA's main aims was to abolish national origin quotas. It eliminated national origin, race, and ancestry as a basis for immigration. The Act prohibits four types of unlawful discrimination: