The Seasonal Employment Alliance (SEA) was established in 2017. SEA’s primary focus is the application of persistent grassroots advocacy of Congress and the Administration. SEA has spearheaded the grassroots effort to communicate to Congress the critical labor needs of our members, including driving and arranging Hill meetings with SEA members’ Representatives, summarizing and disseminating the intelligence gained back to our members, and importantly – driving the appropriate follow up with every member of Congress. SEA created and maintains a comprehensive database that tracks these efforts. This information allows us to better hold our Members of Congress accountable and more precisely directs our lobbying activities.
Our revamped organization, and the H-2B industry, now has a dedicated, first-class support team whose sole focus is the application of persistent, grassroots oriented H-2B advocacy. Significantly increasing H-2B program user participation in our advocacy efforts is a priority for our new organization and is essential to achieving both short-term and long-term program reforms including cap relief.
We have made tremendous progress since SEA was founded in late 2017 including:
- Doubled the number of supporters of the H-2B program in the House and Senate;
- Number of signatories on pro-H-2B House letters have increased from 40-50 to over 100;
- Number of signatories on pro-H-2B Senate letters have increased from 15 or 20 signatories to 35-40
- Obtained cap relief language in the last seven House Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) appropriations bills;
- Secured a record 64,716 additional H-2B visas for FY23, largely as a result of our supporting role of the administration’s Northern Triangle policy;
- Negotiated Seasonal Employer Protection Act with Labor in December of 2022. This was the first deal reached between Labor and H-2B stakeholders since the inception of the H-2B program. The language would have provided most of our members with permanent workforce certainty.
We will continue to advocate to improve the dependability, efficiency and long-term viability of the H-2B Program.