US lawmakers propose a bill to restrict H-1B and L1 visas, prioritizing STEM workers and increasing penalties for wage violations
In a move that could impact Indian professionals, Democrats and Republicans in the US Senate have introduced a Bill to further restrict access to the H-1B and L1 visa programmes for foreign workers.
The legislation proposes new wage and recruitment guidelines for employers, prioritising H-1B visas for workers with STEM degrees as well as increased penalties for wage violations. The bill - proposed by Republican Senator Chuck Grassley and Democratic Senator Dick Durbin - aims to “target visa fraud and abuse” and provide “protections for American workers”. However, it is unclear if the bill will become law given that most immigration reform legislation introduced in US Congress has failed over the last decade.
“Major companies are laying off thousands of American workers while filing thousands of visa petitions for foreign workers at depressed wages and poor working conditions. Congress must step in to protect American workers and fix our broken immigration system. Senator Grassley and I will work to make this bipartisan bill the law of the land,” Senator Durbin said in a statement.
This development comes just weeks after US President Donald Trump announced a $100,000 fee for H-1B visa applications. Trump’s announcement --which the White House said was motivated by “systemic” abuse of the H-1B visa programme --is expected to make it uneconomical for US companies to hire foreign workers. US immigration agencies have also announced plans to rejig the H-1B visa lottery to favour higher paid workers. The US department of Labour also launched Operation Firewall, an enforcement effort to crack down on fraud and misuse of the H-1B programme.
These policy decisions will impact thousands of Indian professionals in America on work visas, according to immigration lawyers.
The new bill - christened the H-1B and L-1 Visa Reform Act - is expected to make foreign hiring harder.
“These changes would increase compliance requirements and likely make H-1B hiring more expensive, particularly for companies that have relied on lower wage levels or contract-based staffing. For L-1 visas, which are used for transferring employees within multinational companies, the bill closes existing gaps by limiting outplacement, raising oversight standards, and adding wage and displacement safeguards,” said Nicole Gunara, Principal Immigration Attorney at Manifest Law. Gunara added that the new bill will make it harder to use L1 visas, which will push more companies towards traditional, direct employment.
“What is important to remember is that just 5% of more than 300 immigration bills proposed between 2015 to 2024 became law, so this is a very early stage,” Gunara tells HT.
The H-1B visa programme in its current form was introduced in 1990 as a pathway for workers in specialty occupations to fill crucial shortages in the US economy. The H-1B is granted for a period of three years, which can then be extended by another three years. Thousands of Indian professionals have used H1B as a pathway to work and eventually settle down in the United States.Over 70% of approved H1B visas go to professionals from India, who will be disproportionately affected by the new visa application hike.
Indian companies like Infosys and Tata Consultancy Services are among the top 10 sponsors of H1B visas. Meanwhile, the L1 is used by multinational companies - including IT services firms from India - to transfer managers and executives from foreign branches to a related US office for a specified period.
