United States President Donald Trump on Friday signed an order asking companies to pay $100,000 for each H-1B worker visa. These non-immigrant visas allow companies in the US to temporarily employ foreign workers for special occupations.

Over the past few years, Indians have constituted the majority of H-1B visa holders. Indians comprised 72.3% of all H-1B visas issued by the US in the financial year 2022-’23.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said that it was an annual fee.

Trump’s order, which will take effect on September 21, is valid for 12 months.

About 85,000 new H-1B visas are available each year. It currently costs companies $215 to register for the H-1B visa lottery, besides several filing fees.

The Trump administration’s decision is being viewed as a setback to the technology sector in the US that relies heavily on foreign workers, especially from India and China.

The change in application fee will stop large technology companies from bringing in foreign workers “who will take our jobs”, Lutnick said.

Lutnick said that historically, the employment-based green card programme had let in 281,000 persons per year.

“And those people on average earned $66,000…” he said. “So we were taking in the bottom quartile, below the average American, it was illogical.”

A green card, officially known as a Permanent Resident Card, allows an individual to stay and work permanently in the US.

On Friday, Trump also signed an executive order to create the gold card visa programme, which would grant permanent residency to foreigners for $1 million.

Washington has repeatedly said that it was planning changes to the H-1B visa programme, saying that it was “terrible”.

During his first term, Trump had tightened rules on H-1B visas, citing “abuse” and “economic strain”. In 2016, he had criticised the programme saying that it was a way for companies to replace American workers with lower-paid foreign employees.

Since taking office in his second term in January, Trump has announced several measures as part of his immigration crackdown.

In August, the Trump administration said that it was reviewing more than 55 million persons who had valid visas for any violations that could lead to deportation.

Other directives include the deportation of undocumented migrants using military aircraft, imposing additional security measures on foreign students applying to American educational institutes and proposed new rules to limit duration of visas for students and journalists.

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