THE White House has said that the new $100,000 fee for H-1B visas in the United States would not apply to existing visa holders re-entering the country.
It also said the fee would be levied per petition.
White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said in a post on X on Saturday, September 20.
“This is NOT an annual fee. It’s a one-time fee that applies only to the petition,” Leavitt said.
Leavitt clarified that H-1B visa holders outside the United States would not be required to pay the $100,000 fee to return.
She also explained that H-1B visa holders might continue to travel in and out of the country, noting that the new fee would apply only to the next H-1B lottery round, not to current holders or renewals.
The ICIR reported that Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said on Friday that the fee would be charged annually but noted that the specifics were “still being considered.”
However, a White House clarification on Saturday showed that the fee would not be paid annually.
The White House stated that the fee was intended to create a level playing field for American workers, arguing that many were being “replaced with lower-paid foreign labour.”
In a fact sheet released on Saturday, the White House said H-1B visa applications could be exempted from the $100,000 fee on a case-by-case basis “if deemed in the national interest.”
The document also noted that the proportion of IT workers holding H-1B visas had grown from 32 per cent in 2003 to more than 65 per cent in recent years.
President Donald Trump’s executive order directed the Departments of Labor and Homeland Security to issue joint guidance on verification, enforcement, audits, penalties and to also begin a rulemaking process to “revise prevailing wage levels for the H-1B programme” and to “prioritise highly skilled, well-paid H-1B workers.”
Reports indicate that companies such as Microsoft (MSFT.O), JPMorgan (JPM.N), and Amazon (AMZN.O) reacted to Friday’s announcement by emailing their H-1B visa employees, advising them to remain in the United States.
Nasscom, an Indian IT firm, said on Saturday that the the new fee on H-1B visa applications could disrupt global operations of Indian technology service companies that send skilled professionals to the United States.
The ICIR reported that the White House said Trump’s action was intended to address risks to US national security.
“President Trump is imposing higher costs on companies seeking to use the H-1B programme in order to address the abuse of the programme, stop the undercutting of wages, and protect our national security,” it said.
Nanji is an investigative journalist with the ICIR. She has years of experience in reporting and broadcasting human angle stories, gender inequalities, minority stories, and human rights issues. She has documented sexual war crimes in armed conflict, sex for grades in Nigerian Universities, harmful traditional practices and human trafficking.