28 H-1B Contractors Are Building the Department of Labor's Software

The agency that runs the H-1B program also depends on it

The U.S. Department of Labor's Office of Foreign Labor Certification (OFLC) is the office that reviews and certifies every H-1B Labor Condition Application filed in the country — including the very filings examined in this report. At the same time, DOL itself — and its largest statistical agency, the Bureau of Labor Statistics — has been a destination worksite for at least 28 H-1B contract software developers since September 2024.

None of these workers are direct DOL employees. Each placement works through a staffing intermediary: a private company files the LCA and H-1B petition, then places the worker at a DOL facility or has them work remotely "for" DOL under a services contract. This is the same pattern we found at the Texas Office of the Attorney General — third-party firms supplying IT labor to government agencies through the H-1B pipeline.

The filings are remarkably steady — almost every month for 18 consecutive months has at least one new H-1B contractor LCA tied to DOL or BLS. This isn't a one-time project; it's an ongoing pipeline of contract labor supplementing the agency's federal IT workforce.

One firm filed 6 of the 28 — all for "Software Developer"

Raas Infotek LLC filed more H-1B applications tied to DOL than any other staffing firm — six separate LCAs between December 2024 and February 2026, all for the identical job title "Software Developer." The pattern looks less like six different hires and more like a revolving pipeline of placements feeding the same role.

Three "Appian Developer" filings in five weeks

A second pattern emerges around Appian — a low-code business process automation platform. Three separate staffing firms filed Appian-related developer roles tied to DOL within a five-week window in spring 2025, all at nearly identical wages.

Combined with an earlier filing — JNIT Technologies' "Appian Software Developer" placed in Irving, TX in October 2024 at $105,997 — that's four Appian-related H-1B placements tied to DOL within about seven months. SwankTek's "Software Developer" filing in April 2025 ($122,699, Washington DC) sits in the same wage band and timeframe, though its connection to the Appian work specifically isn't confirmed by the disclosure data.

Appian implementations are commonly used by federal agencies for case management and workflow automation — the kind of system that could underpin functions like unemployment insurance appeals, OFLC case processing, or wage and hour investigations. Four contractors building or maintaining the same type of system within seven months suggests an active, ongoing Appian project at DOL.

Mostly DC, mostly mid-level — with two notable exceptions at $150K+

The DOL prevailing wage system assigns Level I through IV based on experience and responsibility, with Level I representing entry-level pay for the occupation and area. Sixty-one percent of these placements are Level II — typical for early-career to mid-level developers. Only 4 of 28 (14%) reach Level III, and none reach Level IV.

The two highest-paid placements — Astor & Sanders' "Senior Database Developer" ($151,004, Dec 2024) and the matching pair of CybeCys/iStream "Sr. Systems Engineer"/"Software Architect" filings ($150,758, both at exactly the same wage) — represent the only Level III roles besides Euclid Elementz's network security position. Two filings sharing the exact same salary to the dollar, eight months and one staffing-firm change apart, is worth noting: CybeCys filed for "Sr. Systems Engineer" in Washington DC in July 2025 at $150,758, and iStream Solutions filed for "Software Architect" in Suitland, MD in March 2026 — also at exactly $150,758. Same number, different firms, different titles, different cities. This could indicate the same position being re-staffed through a different vendor.

All 28 H-1B contractor placements at DOL / BLS

Sorted by filing date. "Worksite" reflects the location listed in the LCA; several are remote/telecommuting arrangements that still designate DOL as the secondary worksite entity.

* Highlighted rows are the four Level III filings — the most senior/specialized roles in this set. All 28 are listed as "Certified" by DOL.

How this compares to DOL's own IT workforce

Federal personnel data shows DOL employs 466 non-supervisory staff in the "Information Technology Management" occupational series, concentrated mainly at the Bureau of Labor Statistics (259 staff, averaging $141,999) and the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Administration and Management (179 staff, averaging $144,608).

Whether these 28 contractor placements represent capacity DOL's 466-person IT workforce couldn't provide, or work that could have gone to existing staff or new federal hires, isn't something the disclosure data alone can answer. But the steady cadence — at least one new filing nearly every month for 18 months — suggests this is a structural part of how DOL builds and maintains its software systems, not a one-off emergency staffing gap.

What the data tells us

The Department of Labor administers the H-1B program for the entire United States economy — reviewing wage attestations, certifying Labor Condition Applications, and enforcing compliance through its Wage and Hour Division and the new Project Firewall enforcement initiative. At the same time, the agency's own software development and IT infrastructure work has been substantially supported by H-1B contractors for at least 18 consecutive months.

Twenty-one different staffing firms, 28 separate LCAs, and a steady monthly cadence point to an established pipeline rather than isolated hires. The concentration around "Software Developer" roles (82% of filings) and recurring technology clusters — Appian workflow development, SAS analytics at BLS, database and network engineering — suggests these contractors are doing core, ongoing IT work rather than short-term specialty projects.

Compare with the Texas A&M H-1B report  ·  Explore Texas state employee data at guestworkervisas.com/tx_employees.php