President Donald Trump signed a proclamation Friday requiring companies to pay a $100,000 fee to obtain H-1B worker visas.
The proclamation comes as the Trump administration intensifies its crackdown on immigration, through raids and massive deportation efforts in cities nationwide.
The proclamation-signing is a win for immigration hardliners on Capitol Hill, but is likely to rankle tech executives seeking qualified workers from abroad.
The H-1B visa program, which was signed into law by then-President George H.W. Bush in 1990, enables skilled workers from overseas to temporarily work in the United States. Major tech companies have relied on approvals from the program to hire employees from abroad. Amazon was among the top beneficiaries of the program, according to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services data, with more than 10,000 approvals, followed by Tata Consultancy Services, with 5,500 and Microsoft and Meta, with more than 5,000 approvals each.
Trump said on Friday that tech companies would be pleased with the changes.
“I think they’re going to be very happy. Everyone’s going to be happy,” Trump said.
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, called the move "almost certainly illegal and likely to be struck down in court," in a social media post.
"Congress has only authorized the government to set fees to recover the cost of adjudicating the application. There is no statutory authority to impose fees designed to limit the use of a visa," Reichlin-Melnick wrote.
South Korea, which is still reeling from a Sept. 4 raid by immigration authorities on a Hyundai battery plant in Georgia that saw more than 300 South Koreans detained, said they were paying close attention to Trump’s announcement.
“The South Korean government will comprehensively assess the potential impact of this measure on South Korean companies and professional workers seeking to enter the U.S. market and it will engage in necessary communication with the U.S.,” the country’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
Bloomberg Law first reported on Trump’s plans to sign the proclamation on Friday.
Congress sets an annual cap of 65,000 new visas each fiscal year and another 20,000 for those who have earned a master’s degree or higher, with additional exemptions for universities and research organizations.
During his first term, Trump sought to enact rules that would have dramatically limited the issuing of new skilled-worker visas, citing the economic downturn precipitated by the Covid-19 pandemic and an effort to preserve jobs. The rules were ultimately struck down by a federal court.
More recently, Trump defended the H-1B visa program before taking office in comments to the New York Post in December, telling the outlet, “I have many H-1B visas on my properties. I’ve been a believer in H-1B. I have used it many times. It’s a great program."