President Donald Trump has signed a proclamation imposing a $100,000 fee on H-1B visa applicants.
H-1B visas are designed to bring highly-skilled foreign workers to the U.S. for jobs that are deemed difficult to fill, particularly in tech. Since 2012, about 60 percent of all H-1B visas have gone to workers in computer-related jobs, according to the Pew Research Center.
At the Friday afternoon signing, Trump told reporters, “We need great workers, and this pretty much ensures that that’s what’s going to happen.” Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick also noted the fee will be required annually.
“Everyone’s going to be happy, and we’re going to be able to keep people in our country that are going to be very productive people,” Trump said. “And in many cases, these companies are going to pay a lot of money for that, and they’re very happy about it.”
Trump also signed an executive order creating a long-promised “gold card” for foreigners to pay $1 million for U.S. residency.
Some in the tech world are already expressing concern about the move.
Deedy Das, a partner at the venture capital firm Menlo Ventures, called the decision “devastating news” on X.
“It creates disincentive to attract the world’s smartest talent to the US,” Das wrote. “They have to pay a high education price and may now not be able to easily recoup it with a job. If the U.S. ceases to attract the best talent, it drastically reduces it’s ability to innovate and grow the economy. It makes U.S.’ global competitiveness a lot worse.”
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, warned that this could worsen the existing physician shortage in the U.S.
“There is a doctor shortage in the U.S. right now. Every year, hundreds of doctors get H-1B visas to help fill those gaps,” Reichlin-Melnick wrote on X. “If hospitals had to pay an additional $100,000 fee, it’s possible they would simply give up and not even try to fill positions.”
H-1B visas became a contentious issue in MAGA-world late last year, when Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy faced backlash from many members of Trump’s conservative base after they expressed support for the program.
Trump defended the program at the time, telling the New York Post in December that he has “always been in favor of the visas.” His wife, First Lady Melania Trump, was granted an H-1B visa in 1996 to work in the U.S. as a model. They met in 1998 and married in 2005.
The U.S. government grants 65,000 H-1B visas each year, with another 20,000 available for workers with an advanced degree from a U.S. institution.
Critics of the H-1B visa program say the eligible jobs are often entry-level rather than senior roles, and that companies can pay employees less by classifying jobs at lower skill levels, regardless of the worker’s experience, the Associated Press reports.
