President Donald Trump’s administration wants to overhaul the nation’s visa programme for highly skilled foreign workers.
If the administration does what one official described, it would change H-1B visa rules to favour employers that pay higher wages. That could effectively transform the visa into what one expert called “a luxury work permit” and disadvantage early-career workers with smaller salaries, including teachers. It could also upend the current visa programme’s lottery system used to distribute visas to eligible foreign workers.
“This shift may prevent many employers, including small and midsize businesses, from hiring the talent they need in shortage occupations, ultimately reducing America’s global competitiveness,” said David Leopold, a former president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association whose practice includes representing employers in the H-1B process.
It’s hard to find US workers in certain types of specialty fields, including software engineers and developers and some STEM positions.
A White House office proposed the change on August 8, Bloomberg Law reported. Once the proposal appears in the Federal Register – the daily public report containing notices of proposed federal rule changes – the plan will become subject to a formal public comment period. It could be finalised within months, although it is likely to face legal challenges.
Joseph Edlow, the director of US Citizenship and Immigration Services, told The New York Times in July that H-1B visas should favour companies that plan to pay foreign workers higher wages. The proposal Bloomberg Law described was in line with that goal.
PolitiFact did not see a copy of the proposal, and the White House did not respond to our questions. But the Department of Homeland Security submitted the proposed rule to a Trump administration office in July, the Greenberg Traurig law firm wrote.
Trump sought to reform the H-1B program during his first term but made limited progress. In January 2021, near the end of Trump’s term, the Department of Homeland Security published a final rule similar to the current proposal, but the Biden administration did not implement it.
Work visas were not a central part of Trump’s 2024 immigration platform, but it was a point of debate in the weeks before he took office, with billionaire businessman Elon Musk – a megadonor to Trump who would briefly serve in his administration – speaking in favour of them.
What are H-1B visas?
The H-1B visa programme lets employers temporarily hire foreign workers in specialty fields, with about two-thirds working in computer-related jobs, according to the Congressional Research Service. Most H-1B visa holders come from India, followed by China.
Currently, prospective H-1B employers must attest that they will pay the H-1B worker actual wages paid to similar employees or the prevailing wages for that occupation – whichever would result in the highest pay.
To qualify for the non-immigrant visa, the employee must hold a specialised degree, license or training required by the occupation. The status is generally valid for up to three years and renewable for another three years, but it can be extended if the employer sponsors the worker for permanent residency, which includes permission to work and live in the US.
Leopold said that the proposed change goes beyond the law’s current wage mandate.
“This statutory mechanism is designed to prevent employers from paying H-1B workers less than their American counterparts, thereby protecting US workers from displacement,” Leopold said.
Congress caps new H-1B visas at 85,000 per fiscal year, including 20,000 for noncitizens who earned advanced degrees. The government approved 400,000 H-1B applications, including renewals, in 2024, according to the nonpartisan Pew Research Center.
Amazon has led the nation’s employers since 2020 in its number of H-1B workers, Pew found.
The New York metro area received more H-1B application approvals than any other metro area; College Station, Texas had the highest concentration of approvals.
What could change with H1-B visas?
The proposed policy favours higher-paid employees, experts said.
Malcolm Goeschl, a San Francisco-based lawyer, said the rule will likely benefit tech companies, including many specialising in artificial intelligence. Such companies pay high salaries, including for entry-level positions. He said it will harm traditional tech companies’ programmes for new graduates.
“There will likely be plenty of lottery numbers available at the top of the prevailing wage scale, but very few or none at the bottom,” Goeschl said. “You may see young graduates shy away from the US labour market early on because of this. Or you could see companies just pay entry-level workers from other countries much higher salaries to get a chance in the lottery, leading to the perverse situation where the foreign workers are making a lot more money than similarly situated US workers.”
The prevailing wage requirements are designed to protect US jobs from being undercut by lower paid foreign workers.
David Bier, director of immigration studies at the libertarian Cato Institute, said the change would likely make it nearly impossible for recent immigrant college graduates, who tend to earn lower wages, to launch their careers in the United States on an H-1B visa.
“The short-term benefit would be the people who get selected are more productive, but the long-term cost might be to permanently redirect future skilled immigration to other countries,” Bier said. “It would also effectively prohibit the H-1B for many industries that rely on it. K-12 schools in rural areas seeking bilingual teachers, for instance, will have no chance under this system.”
Amid a nationwide teacher shortage, some school districts have hired H-1B visa holders, including smaller districts such as Jackson, Mississippi, and larger districts, including Dallas, Texas. Language immersion schools also often employ teachers from other countries using this visa programme.
Why is there a debate about H-1B visas?
The debate around H-1B visas does not neatly fall along partisan lines.
Proponents say the existing visa programme allows American employers to fill gaps, compete with other countries and recruit the “best minds”. Critics point to instances of fraud or abuse and say they favour policies that incentivise hiring Americans.
In December, high-profile Republicans debated the visa programme on social media.
MAGA influencer Laura Loomer denounced the programme and former Trump adviser Steve Bannon called it a “scam”. On the other side, billionaire Elon Musk, a former H-1B visa holder whose companies employ such visa holders, called for the programme’s reform but defended it as an important talent recruitment mechanism.
Trump sided with Musk.
“I have many H-1B visas on my properties,” Trump told the New York Post in late December. “I’ve been a believer in H-1B. I have used it many times. It’s a great programme.”
Senator Bernie Sanders disputed Musk, saying corporations abuse the programme as a way to get richer and should recruit American workers first.
Such visa debates have continued.
When US Representative Greg Murphy, a urologist, argued on X August 8 that the visas “are critical for helping alleviate the severe physician shortage”, thousands replied. Christina Pushaw, a Republican who works for Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, pushed back: “Why not figure out the causes of the domestic physician shortage and try to pass legislation to address those?”
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