Trump’s $100,000 H-1B visa fee stays blocked after appeals court ruling. All you need to know

A US federal appeals court on Friday (July 24) rejected the Trump administration's attempt to reinstate a controversial $100,000 fee on new H-1B visas, dealing another setback to President Donald Trump's immigration policy aimed at highly skilled foreign workers.

The Boston-based First US Circuit Court of Appeals declined to stay a lower court order issued on 8 June that barred the administration from imposing the fee. The ruling came in response to a lawsuit filed by 20 Democratic state attorneys general, who argued that the charge amounted to an unlawful tax that Congress had never authorised.

In its decision, the three-judge panel said the administration had failed to demonstrate that it was likely to succeed on appeal in proving it had acted within its legal authority when introducing the fee. The panel, which consists of judges appointed by Democratic presidents, left the lower court's injunction in place while the broader legal challenge continues.

Trump announced the steep increase in September through a presidential proclamation, raising the cost of obtaining new H-1B visas from the typical range of about $2,000 to $5,000, depending on the application, to $100,000.

The H-1B visa programme, widely used by technology companies and other employers to recruit highly skilled foreign workers, issues 65,000 visas each year, along with an additional 20,000 reserved for applicants holding advanced degrees. Successful applicants are generally granted visas valid for three to six years.

Defending the policy, Trump said the H-1B programme "has been deliberately exploited to replace, rather than supplement, American workers with lower-paid, lower-skilled labour". The administration argued the higher fee would discourage misuse of the visa system.

The fee, however, did not apply to foreign nationals already in the United States on student visas, a category that accounts for a significant proportion of new H-1B recipients.

According to court filings, few employers have paid the new fee since it was introduced. The White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment following the appeals court's decision.