President Trump on Friday said that the federal government would begin adding a $100,000 application fee for visas given to skilled foreign workers, a significant overhaul of how the United States distributes what are known as H-1B visas.
Mr. Trump signed a proclamation in the Oval Office instituting the fee, the latest step in the administration’s broader crackdown on all forms of immigration. Companies that hire the workers would likely pay the fee.
“Either the person is very valuable to the company and America, or they’re going to depart, and the company is going to hire an American,” Howard Lutnick, the commerce secretary, said at the signing. “And that’s the point of immigration: Hire Americans and make sure the people coming in are the top, top people.”
He added: “Stop the nonsense of letting people just come into this country on these visas that were given away for free.”
Administration officials said the fee would help American workers’ wages by discouraging companies from using the visas to bring in lower-wage international workers. Such an expense would also limit the number of applicants and provide more certainty for companies that had relied on a lottery, the officials added.
Historically, 85,000 new visas have been provided annually to hire so-called high-skilled foreign workers at companies through that lottery process.
The new fee is a strike against a program that many companies, including those in Silicon Valley, rely on to bring in specialized workers. It also partly resolves a debate among some conservatives that began last winter.
Immigration hard-liners have argued that the foreign visa worker program has hurt the United States, because companies have brought in foreign workers at lower wages, displacing Americans. Business leaders, particularly in the technology sector, have said that the visa program has helped to keep American companies competitive.
The debate has pitted some of Mr. Trump’s most loyal backers against some of his biggest financial boosters. With Friday’s proclamation, the president indicated that, for now, he was siding with those looking to make the visa program more difficult to use.
Mr. Lutnick said the fee applied to new applicants and people looking to renew their H-1B visas. Companies would have to pay the fee annually, for up to six years.
“If you’re going to train somebody, you’re going to train one of the recent graduates from one of the great universities across our land, train Americans,” he said. “Stop bringing in people to take our jobs. That’s the policy here.”
Tyler Pager is a White House correspondent for The Times, covering President Trump and his administration.
Hamed Aleaziz covers the Department of Homeland Security and immigration policy for The Times.
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