New immigration crackdown: Trump to impose $100,000 fee per year for H1B visas; Indian techies likely to be impacted

This move is likely to impact a large number of Indian tech workers, who constitute a major portion of the beneficiaries.

“We need great workers, and this pretty much ensures that that’s what’s going to happen,” Trump said from the Oval Office as quoted by CNN.

In a statement issued sharing details about the proclamation, White House said: "The H-1B nonimmigrant visa program was created to bring temporary workers into the United States to perform additive, high-skilled functions, but it has been deliberately exploited to replace, rather than supplement, American workers with lower-paid, lower-skilled labour."

The White House said the large-scale replacement of American workers through 'systemic abuse' of the program has undermined both our economic and national security.  

  The statement pointed out that Information technology (IT) firms, in particular, have prominently manipulated the H-1B system, significantly harming American workers in computer-related fields.  

"The share of IT workers in the H-1B program grew from 32 percent in Fiscal Year (FY) 2003 to an average of over 65 percent in the last 5 fiscal years," reads the statement.

The White House said the abuse of the H-1B program is posing a national security threat.

STEM workers are increasing in the US

The statement said the number of foreign science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) workers in the United States has more than doubled between 2000 and 2019, increasing from 1.2 million to almost 2.5 million, while overall STEM employment has only increased 44.5 percent during that time.

Experts react  

Deedy Das, partner at venture capital firm Menlo Ventures, reacted to the development and wrote on X, "If the US ceases to attract the best talent, it drastically reduces it's ability to innovate and grow the economy. It makes US' global competitiveness a lot worse."

He further said: "The program should be modified to reduce abuse while continuing to make America an attractive destination for the best global talent. This rule, interpreted as is today, could cut out both."  

Democrat Nick Pyati, an Indian-origin congressional candidate who worked for Microsoft, rebuked the order and wrote on X: " Donald Trump is already sapping America’s economic strength with a tariff on goods, and now he’s hurting us further with a tariff on talent."

He said: "There are bright, talented, driven people all over the world, and the United States is fortunate that a lot of them want to be here. "

What is H-1B visa?

As per the US Department of Labor website, the H-1B program applies to employers seeking to hire non-immigrant aliens as workers in speciality occupations or as fashion models of distinguished merit and ability.

"The intent of the H-1B provisions is to help employers who cannot otherwise obtain needed business skills and abilities from the U.S. workforce by authorizing the temporary employment of qualified individuals who are not otherwise authorized to work in the United States,"  reads the website.