The US government on Friday filed a lawsuit against tech giant Facebook, accusing it of “intentional and widespread” violations of the laws to discriminate against American workers and favour H-1B visa holders.

The lawsuit, by the Justice Department, alleges that the tech giant refused to recruit or consider hiring qualified and available US workers for over 2,600 positions and instead, reserved for temporary visa holders it sponsored for permanent work authorisation.

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Notably, the positions that Facebook allegedly discriminated upon offer an average salary of nearly $156,000.

According to the lawsuit, which followed a nearly two-year investigation by the Justice Department, Facebook intentionally created a hiring system in which it denied qualified US workers a fair opportunity to learn about and apply for jobs that the company instead sought to channel to temporary visa holders.

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Meanwhile, Facebook, in a statement, said it “has been cooperating with the DOJ in its review of this issue and while we dispute the allegations in the complaint, we cannot comment further on pending litigation.”

President Donald Trump has been raising concern for years about foreigners competing with American citizens for jobs. In June, the Trump administration extended a ban on green cards issued outside the US until the end of the year.