President Donald Trump on Friday signed a proclamation imposing a $100,000 annual fee on companies that sponsor foreign workers under the H-1B visa program, in what could be the most dramatic change to the system since its creation in 1990. Alongside the move, Trump introduced a new “gold card” visa that would grant U.S. permanent residency to individuals who can afford to pay $1 million.
Announcing the changes at the White House, Trump said the new rules would ensure only the “best and brightest” come to the United States. “The main thing is, we’re going to have great people coming in, and they’re going to be paying,” he told reporters.
The H-1B program currently allows 85,000 foreign workers each year, typically in specialized fields such as engineering, computer programming, and scientific research, to live and work in the United States. Visas are issued for an initial three-year term and may be extended to six years. Under the new directive, employers will be required to pay $100,000 for each H-1B worker annually — potentially adding up to $300,000 over a single visa cycle.
Administration officials argued the new fees would discourage companies from overreliance on foreign labor. “If you’re going to train somebody, you’re going to train one of the recent graduates from one of the great universities across our land. Train Americans. Stop bringing in people to take our jobs,” U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said. He also insisted that “all the big companies are on board” with the policy, though he acknowledged some implementation details remain under review.
Business leaders and immigration advocates reacted sharply, warning the measures could undermine U.S. competitiveness. Deedy Das, a partner at venture capital firm Menlo Ventures, said on X that the fee “creates disincentive to attract the world’s smartest talent to the U.S.,” adding that losing global talent would “drastically reduce [America’s] ability to innovate and grow the economy.”
Analysts further cautioned that the changes may drive companies to move high-value work overseas, particularly in the race to develop artificial intelligence technologies against competitors such as China. “In the short term, Washington may collect a windfall; in the long term, the U.S. risks taxing away its innovation edge, trading dynamism for short-sighted protectionism,” said Jeremy Goldman, an analyst at eMarketer.
Legal experts also questioned the administration’s authority to impose such high fees. “Congress has only authorized the government to set fees to recover the cost of adjudicating an application,” said Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, policy director at the American Immigration Council. “Anything beyond that risks overstepping legal boundaries.”
The announcement marks the latest in a series of restrictive immigration policies under Trump, who has argued that tightening rules around foreign workers and international students will protect domestic labor and national security. His administration has previously floated ideas to prioritize H-1B visas for higher-paying employers and has enacted travel bans and social media vetting requirements for foreign applicants.
Tech giants remain the biggest beneficiaries of the H-1B system, with Amazon securing more than 10,000 visas this year, followed by Tata Consultancy, Microsoft, Apple, and Google. California hosts the largest concentration of H-1B workers, while India remains the top source country, accounting for 71 percent of all approved visas in 2022.
If fully implemented, the new fees could cost U.S. companies billions of dollars annually, a burden experts say will fall especially hard on smaller firms and start-ups that rely on foreign talent to grow. The policy, they warn, could reshape America’s position in the global technology and innovation landscape for years to come.
