{"id":49159,"date":"2026-06-09T09:32:01","date_gmt":"2026-06-09T03:47:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/?p=49159"},"modified":"2026-06-09T09:32:01","modified_gmt":"2026-06-09T03:47:01","slug":"trumps-100000-h-1b-visa-fee-is-unlawful-us-judge-rules","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/trumps-100000-h-1b-visa-fee-is-unlawful-us-judge-rules\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump’s $100,000 H-1B visa fee is unlawful, US judge rules"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Reuters<\/strong> : A federal judge on Monday struck down a $100,000 fee U.S. President Donald Trump imposed on new H-1B visas for highly skilled \u200cforeign workers, concluding that it constituted an unlawful tax Congress never authorized.<\/p>\n

U.S. District Judge Leo Sorokin in Boston issued the ruling, opens new tab in a lawsuit filed by 20 Democratic state attorneys general challenging a fee Trump announced in September that dramatically raised the cost of obtaining H-1B visas, which tech companies in particular rely heavily on to bring on foreign workers.<\/p>\n

The \u200badministration argued the fee constituted a lawful monetary penalty that the president was authorized to impose under federal immigration law, which gives \u200bhim the power to restrict the entry of certain foreign nationals when he deems it “detrimental to the interests of the \u2060United States.”<\/p>\n

But Sorokin concluded that the fee was not a penalty but a tax that the Republican president lacked any authorization from Congress to \u200bissue and that the U.S. State Department and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services could not implement.
\n“Here, the substance and application of the $100,000 payment reveal that \u200bit is a tax, regardless of what the payment is called,” wrote Sorokin, who was appointed by Democratic President Barack Obama.<\/p>\n

The judge cited the U.S. Supreme Court’s February ruling striking down Trump’s sweeping tariffs he pursued under a law meant for use in national emergencies. Under the logic of the justices’ decision in that case, Trump similarly had no \u200bauthority under immigration law to levy a tax, Sorokin said.<\/p>\n

White House spokeswoman Taylor Rogers in a statement said the Trump administration is confident Sorokin’s \u200border will be reversed on appeal.<\/p>\n

“President Trump has clear legal authority to restrict entry of any class of aliens he determines is not in America\u2019s best interests, and \u200cthat is \u2060exactly what he did,” she said.<\/p>\n

The H-1B program offers 65,000 visas annually, with another 20,000 visas for workers with advanced degrees, approved for three to six years. Employers seeking a visa for a foreign worker before Trump’s proclamation typically paid about $2,000 to $5,000 in fees depending on various factors.<\/p>\n

Trump, in imposing the hefty new fee, in a proclamation said the H-1B program “has been deliberately exploited to replace, rather than supplement, American workers with lower-paid, lower-skilled labor.”<\/p>\n

The fee \u200bdoes not apply to visas granted \u200bto foreign citizens already in \u2060the United States on student visas, who generally make up a large share of new H-1B recipients.<\/p>\n

Few employers have paid Trump’s fee since it was instituted. As of February 15, USCIS had received just 85 payments of the $100,000 fee, an agency \u200bofficial said in a March filing.<\/p>\n

The Trump administration has also ordered enhanced vetting of H-1B applicants and proposed a \u200bnew visa selection \u2060process that would favor higher-skilled and better-paid workers.<\/p>\n

The $100,000 fee prompted at least three different lawsuits challenging its implementation, including a case by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which is appealing a December decision by a judge in Washington, D.C., who rejected its claims that Trump had no authority to set the fee.<\/p>\n

California Attorney General \u2060Rob Bonta, \u200ba Democrat who led the multi-state coalition that filed the case before Sorokin, hailed his \u200bruling for striking down Trump’s “unlawful and costly $100,000 tax.”<\/p>\n

“This tax was an attack on America’s ability to attract and retain the high-skilled talent that strengthens our economy and helps us meet critical \u200bworkforce needs,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reuters : A federal judge on Monday struck down a $100,000 fee U.S. President Donald Trump imposed on new H-1B visas for highly skilled \u200cforeign workers, concluding that it constituted an unlawful tax Congress never authorized. U.S. District Judge Leo Sorokin in Boston issued the ruling, opens new tab in a lawsuit filed by 20 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":49160,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-49159","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49159"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49159"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49159\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":49162,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49159\/revisions\/49162"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/49160"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49159"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49159"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49159"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}