The Trump administration is adding $100,000 to the existing fee for H-1B visa applications, taking aim at a program that is used to attract highly skilled workers to the U.S.
President Trump signed an executive order late Friday adding the new visa application fee and barring H-1B workers from entering the U.S. unless they had made the $100,000 payment.
“We’re going to be able to keep people in our country that are going to be very productive people, and in many cases these companies are going to pay a lot of money for that, and they’re very happy about it,” Mr. Trump said.
The additional charge would impact employers including technology giants such as Amazon, IBM, Microsoft and Google, which have relied on the program to hire foreign workers.
The plan was reported earlier by Bloomberg News.
H-1B visas are already expensive, with the cost ranging from about $1,700 to $4,500, depending on whether the visa is expedited. The fees are typically considered a business expense for the employer.
The new fee comes amid a debate over the H-1B visa, which some critics say enables companies to hire foreign applicants at lower salaries than American workers. Some employers also award H-1Bs for entry-level roles rather than for senior positions with greater skill requirements, detractors of the program say.
Tech companies have been among the primary beneficiaries of the visa program. Amazon received the most H1-B visas of any business in 2024, Department of Labor data shows. This year, the online retailer remains the leading recipient of the visas, with more than 10,000 awarded, followed by Tata Consultancy, Microsoft, Apple and Google.
“This will ensure that the people they’re bringing in are actually very highly skilled and that they’re not replaceable by American workers. So it’ll protect American workers, but ensure that companies have a pathway to hire truly extraordinary people and bring them to the United States,” a White House aide said.
Still, Stuart Anderson, executive director of the National Foundation for American Policy, a nonpartisan research group, said the plan could backfire if it incentivizes U.S. companies to shift jobs overseas, especially in specialized areas like research and development.
“The second impact will further decrease the number of international students who have an interest in coming to study in the U.S. If there’s no opportunity work in the U.S., it’s much less likely they’ll enroll in U.S. programs,” Anderson told CBS News.
Last year, the most popular type of job for H-1B visas was software developer. To receive an H-1B visa, which is awarded by lottery, an applicant needs to have at least a bachelor’s degree in their field and have been offered a temporary job by a U.S. company.
President Trump plans to order the Labor Secretary to start a new rule-making process that would update wage levels for the program, Bloomberg reported. Currently, U.S. companies must offer the prevailing wage or the actual wage of similarly qualified workers, whichever is higher, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.
The program is capped at 65,000 new visas each year, although an additional 20,000 can be issued for employees with a master’s degree or higher, according to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. The cap and higher-degree exemption quota is already filled for fiscal year 2026, according to the USCIS.
The H-1B program is already the most restrictive visa program in the U.S., with about 20% of applications resulting in approved workers, according to a March study from the nonpartisan National Foundation for American Policy.
