The new plan follows Friday’s declaration, and will require a $100,000 fee for the new H-1B application.
Released on September 23, 2025
The White House has announced a proposal to remake the H-1B visa selection process in favor of highly skilled and better paid workers, according to a notification in the federal register.
The new proposal, released Tuesday, introduced a $100,000 fee on visas following the White House declaration on Friday.
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The new process, if finalized, will give more weight to applications by employers paying high wages if the annual visa request exceeds the statutory limit of 85,000, the notice states. He said the move aims to better protect U.S. workers from unfair wage competition from foreign workers.
After taking office in January, US President Donald Trump launched a wide range of immigration crackdowns, including pushing for massive deportation and attempting to block the citizenship of undocumented immigrant children born in the United States. Recently, his administration has strengthened its focus on H-1B programs, popular among technology and outsourcing companies, to hire skilled foreign workers.
The administration said Friday that it would ask businesses to pay $100,000 a year for each H-1B visa. Some big tech companies warned visa holders to stay in the US or return soon, causing chaotic scramblings to return to the US. The White House later revealed that the fees would only apply to new visas.
On Wall Street, tech companies’ stocks are less responsive to the looming changes. Shares of Amazon, which sponsors H-1B visas for any company, have fallen almost 5% over the past five days.
Planned regulations posted Tuesday will modify existing lottery processes to obtain a visa if demand exceeds supply in a given year, creating wage tiers that are likely to be selected for a high-paying job.
The finalization process of regulations can take months or years. The notice suggested that new rules may be in place for the 2026 lottery.
Total wages paid to H-1B workers were expected to increase to $522 million in 2026.
He said these wages would increase by $1 billion in fiscal year 2027, $1.5 billion in fiscal year 2028, and $2 billion in fiscal year 2029-2035.
The estimated 5,200 small businesses currently receiving H-1B visas will have a significant economic impact from the loss of their workforce, DHS said.
The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, which issued the proposal, will provide 30 days for comments that begin Wednesday, starting 30 days, the notification said.
Slowing the job market
The high requirement was proposed as a new AP-NORC poll was released in March 2024, which believes it sees a great profit from immigrants entering the US workforce from four in 10 people.
According to polls, 51% of US adults say the “major” advantage of legal immigration is that American companies gain expertise in areas such as science and technology.
This new proposal is because employment growth in the United States is a food stall.
According to the latest employment report released by the Ministry of Labor, only 22,000 jobs were added in August.
Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has described Trump’s hard-line immigration policies as part of the central bank’s rationale for slowing the job market and reducing interest rates by 25 basis points, the first cut since December.
