Tim Cook tweets support for 'Dreamers,' says 250 work for Apple
Tim Cook, chief executive of Apple Inc. AAPL, +0.03% , again voiced his support for “Dreamers” — the children of undocumented immigrants — on Sunday, saying 250 of them work for Apple.
“They deserve our respect as equals and a solution rooted in American values,” Cook said in a tweet.
250 of my Apple coworkers are #Dreamers. I stand with them. They deserve our respect as equals and a solution rooted in American values.
— Tim Cook (@tim_cook) September 3, 2017
On Thursday, Cook joined about 300 top business leaders — including executives from Microsoft Corp. MSFT, -1.11% , Amazon.com Inc. AMZN, -0.24% , Alphabet Inc’s GOOG, -0.21%GOOGL, -0.34% Google, and Netflix Inc. NFLX, +0.02% — in an open letter urging President Donald Trump to preserve Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, an Obama-era program that allows nearly 800,000 “Dreamers” to avoid deportation and work in the U.S. Trump has threatened to end the program, and is expected to make an announcement Tuesday.
“Dreamers are vital to the future of our companies and our economy,” the letter read. “They are part of why we will continue to have a global competitive advantage.”
DACA allows for qualified children of undocumented immigrants, who have undergone extensive background checks, to work in the U.S. They pay Medicare, Social Security and income taxes. “Our economy would lose $460.3 billion from the national GDP and $24.6 billion in Social Security and Medicare tax contributions,” if DACA was ended, the letter said.
Last week, Microsoft President Brad Smith wrote a blog post supporting Dreamers, and CEO Satya Nadella added his own post, saying, “We care deeply about the DREAMers who work at Microsoft and fully support them.”
Apple and Microsoft are not the only major U.S. companies employing Dreamers. According to Thursday’s letter, 72% of Fortune 500 companies have DACA recipients among their workforce.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/tim-cook-tweets-support-for-dreamers-says-250-work-for-apple-2017-09-03