The United States Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division announced that $18.25 million in back pay has been processed for U.S. workers as part of a previously announced settlement with Apple, Inc. (“Apple”).
The Department opened an investigation into Apple in 2019 under the first Trump administration, as part of the Protecting U.S. Workers Initiative (“Initiative”). After finding that Apple’s hiring and recruitment practices deterred U.S. workers from applying to positions, the Department settled the matter in 2023 for $18.25 million in back pay to compensate qualifying U.S. workers and $6.75 million in civil penalties.
“The Civil Rights Division will keep fighting for U.S. workers and will hold companies accountable for favoring temporary visa holders for American jobs,” said Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. “We appreciate Apple’s cooperation to ensure that this settlement was fully implemented.”
The claims administration process for this resolution involved a thorough and individualized assessment of thousands of potential claimants, including a review of each U.S. worker’s lost income to determine exact back-pay amounts for each qualifying U.S. worker. The Department’s oversight over this complex process ensured exhaustion of the entire back-pay fund and that Apple compensated qualifying U.S. workers harmed by its past practices.
In addition to monetary relief, the settlement also required Apple to give U.S. workers greater opportunities to apply for positions advertised as part of Permanent Labor Certification (“PERM”) recruitment. These changes included requiring Apple to post PERM positions on its external job website, accept electronic applications, and train its employees on the anti-discrimination requirements of the Immigration and Nationality Act (“INA”).
Since the January 2025 relaunch of the Initiative, the Department has obtained eleven settlements to enforce the INA’s prohibition on citizenship status discrimination against companies that illegally discriminate against U.S. workers in favor of those with temporary employment visas. For information about additional settlements under the Protecting U.S. Workers Initiative, visit IER’s website.
The public can call IER’s free hotline at 1-800-255-7688 for workers or at 1-800-255-8155 for employers (1-800-237-2515, TTY for hearing impaired) for informal assistance between 9am and 5pm Eastern Time, Monday – Friday; sign up for a live webinar or watch an on-demand presentation; email [email protected]; or visit www.justice.gov/ier.
