Several IT firms that appear to bar U.S. citizens from certain jobs also have contracts with the federal government, suggesting that they are discriminating against Americans even as they receive millions in taxpayer largesse.
The Trump administration is now investigating those companies, and the General Services Administration told the Washington Free Beacon it would "take all necessary steps to ensure accountability and compliance."
"Discriminatory practices in procurement are unacceptable—and unlawful," said Josh Gruenbaum, the GSA’s Federal Acquisition Service Commissioner. "We will be issuing a full contract review with our agency partners who have active awards with the named contractors, as well as others as appropriate."
The Free Beacon reported last week that the IT staffing firms LanceSoft and Tekgence had posted job advertisements indicating that "USC," or U.S. citizens, were not eligible for certain roles. Both companies have contracts with federal agencies, according to the GSA’s database of active technology vendors.
Though the GSA does not list the value of either contract, another IT firm, ARK Solutions, has received more than $11 million in government subcontracts since 2023, according to the analytics firm Higher Gov. ARK Solutions has posted multiple job ads that say "No USC," including one for a project in the state of Georgia.
The federal government will be reviewing its relationships with all three companies, as well as a fourth, InfiCare, where a recruiter stated in February that a programming job was open to "H1b only," a reference to H-1B visa holders. Those visas are granted to immigrants in specialized fields such as tech and medicine.
Though InfiCare does not have any active federal contracts, it has been approved by the GSA to sell to the government at pre-negotiated prices. InfiCare did not respond to a request for comment.
It is illegal for employers to discriminate based on citizenship status, and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) specifically warns against job ads that use terms like "H-1B only." Dan Morenoff, the executive director of the American Civil Rights Project, said that flouting that guidance was especially risky for federal contractors, which tend to be subject to heightened scrutiny.
"Given the EEOC’s stated views on the subject, it would take either real bravery or blinding hubris (depending on your perspective) for any company to openly discriminate against Americans in hiring," Morenoff told the Free Beacon. "But for federal contractors to do so, when they know that they operate under much more tightly focused federal scrutiny? That’s just courting disaster."
Some companies are now seeking to distance themselves from the ads. Tekgence told the Free Beacon that its job post "appears to have originated from an independent contractor that was provided with a Tekgence email, but was never an employee of Tekgence," adding that the firm had removed the post and issued new guidelines to recruiters.
"In response to this incident, Tekgence initiated a comprehensive internal compliance review, strengthened third-party access controls, and implemented mandatory immigration-related anti-discrimination training for all employees involved in hiring and recruiting, including guidance and webinars issued by the U.S. Department of Justice’s Immigrant and Employee Rights Section," Tekgence wrote in a statement. "The company does not maintain any policy or practice that restricts employment based on citizenship status, national origin, or any other protected classification."
Tekgence also noted that the ad, like several others reviewed by the Free Beacon, had originated as an email sent to a "limited group" of people, only later appearing on a public website, Nvoids.com, which aggregates job posts made on listservs. That distinction is irrelevant as a legal matter: Companies have been penalized for discriminatory job ads that were not posted publicly, and Andrea Lucas, the chair of the EEOC, said it doesn't matter whether a post is made via email or on a website like Indeed.
"[H]iring discrimination is unlawful whether there is public or private evidence of it," she posted on X.
ARK Solutions did not respond to a request for comment.
When the Free Beacon reached out to the recruiter at LanceSoft, Riyaz Ansari, who advertised a job excluding U.S. citizens, this reporter received an error message stating that Ansari’s email, which had been active as of a week ago, was no longer registered with the company. A LanceSoft spokesman said the firm was "reviewing your inquiry" but did not respond by press time.
The GSA is not the only agency investigating the job ads identified by the Free Beacon. Harmeet Dhillon, the Justice Department’s assistant attorney general for civil rights, said on Saturday that her division would also be reviewing the posts.
"We have a team working on these cases and will look at this," Dhillon posted on X. "Did I mention the Civil Rights Division is hiring, including for lawyers to do more of this work?"
