US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick praised President Donald Trump for signing a proclamation imposing a $100,000 (over Rs 88 lakh) fee on H-1B visa applicants, saying that reversing the “disastrous agenda” of flooding the country with illegal immigrants will significantly benefit Americans.
He said that new visa programmes will ensure that foreign workers provide a “significant benefit” to the United States, rather than simply taking advantage of the economy without offering substantial contributions in return.
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The move has sent shockwaves through the US technology sector, which heavily relies on skilled workers from India and China..
“For the past four years, open-border Democrats endlessly flooded the country with illegal aliens at the expense of hardworking Americans.The Trump administration is completely reversing course on that disastrous agenda. These programs guarantee that recipients who come to work in America must provide significant benefit to our great country. We are ending workers taking jobs away from hard working Americans and taking advantage of our economy and providing nothing in return,” Howard Lutnick said in a post on X.
“The Trump Card begins to restore our immigration system to its intended purpose: significantly benefitting America,” he said.
White House Staff Secretary Will Scharf called the H-1B non-immigrant visa programme one of the “most abused” visa systems in the current immigration structure. “What this proclamation will do is raise the fee that companies must pay to sponsor H-1B applicants to USD 100,000. This will ensure that the people they’re bringing in are actually highly skilled and not easily replaceable by American workers,” he said.
President Trump signed the proclamation on Friday, raising the H-1B visa application fee to USD 100,000, thereby creating a new barrier for companies seeking to hire foreign talent.
“We need workers—great workers—and this pretty much ensures that’s going to happen,” Trump said.
Lutnick said that the increased fee would discourage companies from outsourcing jobs to foreign workers and would encourage them to hire American citizens instead, as part of the Trump administration’s broader crackdown on immigration.
“Stop bringing in people to take our jobs, that’s our policy here,” Lutnick said. “All of the big companies are on board. We’ve spoken to them about the gold card and this.”
In addition to the proclamation, Trump also signed an executive order launching a ‘Gold Card’ visa programme, which he said would fast-track residency and citizenship for select immigrants in exchange for a substantial fee.
As per the orders, foreigners can fast-track their visas by paying USD1 million, while companies can speed up the process for a foreign worker that it sponsors by contributing $2 million.
The ‘Gold Card’ visa programme, offers foreigners a fast track to residency and citizenship for fees of USD 1 million for individuals and USD 2 million for businesses.”We think it’s going to be very successful… It’s going to raise billions of dollars, which will reduce taxes, pay off debt, and do other good things,” Trump said as he signed the executive order.
“Today we are proud to announce THE TRUMP GOLD CARD. The Card will be available for $1 Million Dollars for individuals, and $2 Million Dollars for Corporations. For far too long, we have had millions of Illegal Aliens pouring into our Country, and our Immigration System was broken. It is beyond time that the American People, and American Taxpayers, are benefitting from our LEGAL Immigration System. We anticipate THE TRUMP GOLD CARD will generate well over $100 Billion Dollars very quickly. This money will be used for reducing Taxes, Pro Growth Projects, and paying down our Debt,” Trump wrote on Truth Social .
