The Justice Department sued Cloudera on Tuesday, alleging the Santa Clara-based tech company deliberately steered high-paying jobs to temporary visa holders while blocking U.S. workers from applying.
The Civil Rights Division says in a complaint that Cloudera broke the Immigration and Nationality Act by making a hiring process that kept U.S. workers out in practice. The lawsuit went to the Office of the Chief Administrative Hearing Officer.
The central allegation is specific. According to the Justice Department, Cloudera set up an email account designated for job applications that could not receive messages from outside the company — then instructed candidates to send their applications to that address anyway.
One U.S. worker did what they were told and got a bounce-back message. The Civil Rights Division says that the worker’s later complaint about discrimination led to the investigation.
The complaint also alleges Cloudera misused a federal green card sponsorship program called PERM. Under that program, employers must make a genuine effort to recruit U.S. workers before sponsoring a foreign employee for permanent residency.
The Justice Department alleges Cloudera failed to meet that requirement, sponsoring temporary visa workers for green cards without meaningfully considering U.S. applicants for those same roles.
“Employers cannot use the PERM sponsorship process as a backdoor for discriminating against U.S. workers,” said Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon of the Civil Rights Division. “The Division will not hesitate to sue companies who intentionally deter U.S. workers from applying to American jobs.”
A public response from Cloudera was not immediately available.
The lawsuit is part of the Justice Department’s Protecting U.S. Workers Initiative, relaunched in 2025. The Division said it has reached 10 settlements under the program in the past year.
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