President Donald Trump has effectively erected a financial wall around the H-1B visa program by signing a proclamation that will require employers to pay a $100,000 fee each year for every high-skilled foreign worker. This radical policy shift is the administration’s most aggressive move yet to curb legal immigration and is designed to make hiring foreign talent prohibitively expensive for most companies.
The stated goal, according to Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, is to push companies toward hiring from the domestic talent pool. “The point of immigration,” Lutnick stated, is to “Hire Americans and make sure the people coming in are the top, top people.” By attaching a six-figure price tag to foreign workers, the administration believes companies will be forced to invest in training and recruiting within the United States.
This “financial wall” is expected to have a profound and immediate impact on the U.S. tech industry, which has long been the primary beneficiary of the H-1B program. Roughly two-thirds of all H-1B jobs are computer-related, and companies from startups to behemoths like Amazon and Google rely on this visa category to fill specialized roles and stay competitive.
The move has been met with a mixture of praise from program critics and fierce opposition from the business community. Those who believe the H-1B program depresses American wages see the fee as a long-overdue correction. Conversely, industry leaders and economists warn it could trigger a “brain drain,” where the world’s best talent, and the companies that need them, simply choose to go to other countries with more favorable immigration policies.
As with many of the administration’s previous immigration actions, this one is built on shaky legal ground. Experts contend the president cannot invent new visa fees by proclamation, a power that rests with Congress. This sets the stage for a contentious legal battle, but in the meantime, the policy creates massive uncertainty for businesses and the thousands of skilled professionals hoping to work in the U.S.