The Trump administration stated on Friday it could ask corporations to pay $100,000 per yr for H-1B employee visas, doubtlessly dealing a giant blow to the know-how sector that depends closely on expert employees from India and China.
Since taking workplace in January, Trump has kicked off a wide-ranging immigration crackdown, together with strikes to restrict some types of authorized immigration. The transfer to reshape the H-1B visa program represents his administration’s most high-profile effort to this point to transform momentary employment visas.
“100 thousand {dollars} a yr for H1-B visas, and the entire huge corporations are on board. We have spoken to them,” U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick stated on Friday.
“If you are going to practice someone, you are going to practice one of many latest graduates from one of many nice universities throughout our land. Practice People. Cease bringing in folks to take our jobs,” he stated.
Tech trade vs. Trump
Trump’s menace to crack down on H1-B visas has develop into a significant flashpoint with the tech trade, which contributed thousands and thousands of {dollars} to his presidential marketing campaign.
Critics of this system, together with many U.S. know-how employees, argue that it permits companies to suppress wages and sideline People who might do the roles. Supporters, together with Tesla CEO Elon Musk, say it brings in extremely expert employees important to filling expertise gaps and conserving companies aggressive. Musk, himself a naturalized U.S. citizen born in South Africa, has held an H-1B visa.
Including new charges “creates disincentive to draw the world’s smartest expertise to the U.S.,” stated Deedy Das, associate at enterprise capital agency Menlo Ventures, on X. “If the U.S. ceases to draw the most effective expertise, it drastically reduces its capability to innovate and develop the economic system.”
The brand new charge might considerably push up prices for corporations, notably smaller tech companies and start-ups.
India accounts for many H1-B visas
Roughly two-thirds of jobs secured by the H1-B program are computer-related, authorities figures present, however employers additionally use the visa to usher in engineers, educators and healthcare employees.
India was the most important beneficiary of H-1B visas final yr, accounting for 71% of permitted beneficiaries, whereas China was a distant second at 11.7%, based on authorities information.
Within the first half of 2025, Amazon.com had greater than 10,000 H-1B visas permitted, whereas Microsoft and Meta Platforms META.O had over 5,000 H-1B visa approvals every.
Shares of Cognizant Know-how Options Corp CTSH.O, an IT providers firm that depends extensively on H-1B visa holders, in addition to U.S.-listed shares of Indian tech companies Infosys INFY.Okay and Wipro WIT.N closed between 2% and 5% decrease.
Microsoft declined remark. Different huge tech companies, banks and consulting companies didn’t instantly reply to requests for remark. The Indian embassy in Washington and the Chinese language Consulate Normal in New York additionally didn’t instantly reply to requests for remark.
Reuters was not instantly capable of set up particulars of how the charge can be administered.
Immigration crackdown
The H-1B program affords 65,000 visas yearly to employers bringing in momentary overseas employees in specialised fields, with one other 20,000 visas for employees with superior levels.
Underneath the present system, H-1B candidates pay a small charge to enter a lottery and, if chosen, subsequent charges that may quantity to a number of thousand {dollars}, relying on the case. Practically all of the visa charges must be paid by the employers. The H-1B visas are permitted for a interval of three to 6 years.
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, coverage director of the American Immigration Council, questioned the legality of the proposed new charges. “Congress has solely approved the federal government to set charges to get better the price of adjudicating an utility,” he stated on Bluesky.
The transfer is the newest effort by the Trump administration to curb or elevate more cash from authorized migration. Final month, the U.S. launched a pilot program permitting consular officers to demand bonds of as much as $15,000 for vacationer and enterprise visas from international locations with excessive overstay charges or restricted vetting information.
That adopted Trump’s June journey ban limiting entry from 19 nations.
Trump’s first-term administration issued a number of laws that aimed to restrict entry to H1-B visas and provides them to higher-paying employers, however the laws have been blocked in federal courtroom.
Firms most depending on U.S.-based workers with H-1B visas: https://reut.rs/4mpP387
