Donald Trump’s administration is pursuing major changes to the H-1B visa program, which allows immigrants with specialized skills to legally work in the U.S.
The changes could make it easier to deport H-1B workers if they lose their job and prevent their family members from working in the U.S.
On Thursday, a proposal to eliminate a 60-day grace period for H-1B visa holders to find a new job or adjust their status before their visas lapse cleared a key White House review office, the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Bloomberg Law reported.
According to experts, the plan could make life even more precarious for H-1B visa holders, whose status in the U.S. is tied to their employer.
“This is the scariest situation possible for H-1B visa workers,” entrepreneur and tech expert Vivek Wadhwa wrote on X.
“It pushes them further into indentured servitude and gives unscrupulous employers even more leverage,” he wrote. “It widens wage disparities, suppresses bargaining power, and hurts both H-1B and American workers. And Big Tech won’t lobby against it; only strengthens their leverage.”
The Trump administration is also considering a plan that would bar the spouses of H-1B visa holders from seeking work authorization.
Under a rule from Barack Obama’s administration, some of these immigrants, who hold H-4 dependent visas, were allowed to apply for employment permission if their H-1B spouse was seeking a green card.
Neither plan has been published as a formal proposed rule nor opened to public comment yet.
But the proposals follow the Trump administration’s repeated threats to the H-1B program by seeking to impose new barriers to the process in an effort to ostensibly boost domestic hiring.
The White House has moved to make a more than $103,000 fee for H-1B visas permanent, after a federal judge in June struck down a presidential proclamation imposing the new price tag.
The H-1B program has long been subject to intense bipartisan debate, with backers arguing it helps keep key U.S. industries competitive, while critics allege it allows companies to undercut American workers and leaves foreign visa holders little leverage to negotiate with their employers for fair treatment and pay.
With an annual cap of 85,000 new H-1B visas each year, backlogs to get the visas can stretch decades —especially in countries with large populations such as China and India.
The fate of the H-1B program has also created divisions within the Trump movement, too, given the president’s strong support in corners of Silicon Valley, which often relies heavily on H-1B hires.
During the 2024 campaign season, Trump backers and future DOGE leaders Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy set off a debate within MAGA by championing the program.
Once the president took office, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick called the program a “scam” and Vice President JD Vance hammered tech companies for the “bullsh**” story that they can’t find enough American workers.
Beyond the H-1B process, the Trump administration has moved to revoke hundreds of thousands of visas from people already inside the U.S. as the president champions a government-wide anti-immigration agenda, with the goal of removing 1 million people from the country every year.
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