With a Presidential Proclamation, the US recently introduced a new $100,000 filing fee for a certain category of nonimmigrant workers, namely H-1B petitioners.
This impacts US companies and global employers wishing to to attract high-skilled foreign talent.
H-1B visa program
On September 19, 2025, the US President issued a Proclamation – Restriction on Entry of Certain Nonimmigrant Workers – to address systemic abuse of H-1B, nonimmigrant visas.
The H-1B nonimmigrant visa program aims to bring temporary workers into the United States to perform high-skilled functions. In fact, it should help employers who cannot find the necessary skills and expertise within the US local workforce.
In such cases, the US government allows employers to sponsor foreign workers. The applicant can then obtain the proper H-1B visa if they satisfy all application conditions including the minimum salary requirement.
As a consequence, the H-1B immigration process can be complex since it requires several immigration steps.
Purpose of the Presidential Proclamation
Recently, the US government reported certain cases of illegal exploitations of the H-1B visa program.
In fact, through the Presidential Proclamation, the US President announced that some companies have used the program to replace, rather than supplement, American workers with lower-paid and lower-skilled talent.
According to this announcement, the abuse of the H-1B statute resulted in disadvantageous labor market conditions for local citizens. At the same time, it made it more difficult to attract and retain the highest skilled subset of temporary workers. The large impact was in critical science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) sectors. This has affected especially the information technology (IT) field.
For this reasons, the US government decided to impose higher costs on companies seeking to use the H-1B program. This in order to address the program abuse issue while still permitting companies to hire the best of the best temporary foreign workers.
Effects of the Presidential Proclamation
The new Proclamation restricts H-1B petitions, except for applications accompanied or supplemented by a payment of $100,000.
Therefore, employers shall, prior to filing an H-1B petition on behalf of an alien outside the US, obtain and retain documentation showing the payment of the new fee.
The new rule applies to H-1B employment-based petitions filed after 12:01 AM ET on September 21, 2025. It shall expire, absent extension, 12 months after the effective date of the proclamation.
So, as confirmed also on a memo of September 20th, the Proclamation only applies prospectively to petitions not yet filed. It does not affect aliens who are in one of the following categories:
- Are beneficiaries of petitions filed prior to the effective date of the proclamation.
- Are the beneficiaries of currently approved petitions.
- Are in possession of valid H-1B nonimmigrant visas.
Finally, the Proclamation does not impact the ability of any current visa holder to travel to or from the United States.
