Federal Judge Strikes Down Trump’s $100,000 Fee on New H-1B Visas

A federal judge in Boston on Monday struck down the Trump administration’s $100,000 fee on new H-1B visas for highly skilled foreign workers, ruling that the executive branch exceeded its authority and creating a conflict with an earlier federal ruling that upheld the charge, NPR and PBS NewsHour reported.

U.S. District Judge Leo Sorokin sided with 20 states that had sued, concluding that the policy violated the Administrative Procedure Act, NPR reported. “The Court finds that the Policy imposes a tax on H-1B petitions without the requisite delegation by Congress,” he wrote. PBS described the fee as an unlawful tax that Congress never authorized. Before President Trump announced the fee last September, employers typically paid about $2,000 to $5,000 per petition, PBS said.

The H-1B program, created in 1990, offers visas to about 85,000 people a year, many in technology, PBS reported. Deep-pocketed technology companies are the biggest users, NPR said, with nearly three-quarters of approvals going to workers from India. The administration argued, in PBS’s account, that the program is used to “replace, rather than supplement, American workers,” and announced the higher fee as a way of preventing foreign workers from taking American jobs, NPR said.

The states argued the fee impedes their ability to hire teachers for primary and secondary schools and staff for public colleges and universities, would stymie academic research and would reduce the supply of medical workers. “This victory protects the integrity of the H-1B visa program as a tool to address severe labor shortages in vital industries like education, healthcare, and medical research,” Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell said, according to NPR. Bobby Mukkamala, president of the American Medical Association, called the ruling “a victory for patients.”

The administration pushed back. The Department of Homeland Security said it disagrees with “this blatant judicial activism dismantling President Trump’s historic efforts for immigration reform,” and said the system is being reformed “to serve American citizens, American workers, and American families,” NPR reported. White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers said the administration “is confident this order will be reversed on appeal.”

The ruling does not settle the matter nationally. NPR reported that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce sued in Washington, D.C., and has appealed a denial of summary judgment against the fee, which left the higher charge in effect, at least until September 2026, when it is scheduled to expire. Monday’s decision is also a summary judgment but points the other way. A separate suit in San Francisco, brought by religious groups and labor organizations, sets up the possibility of divided rulings in three federal appeals circuits. NPR noted that the announcement of the fee had set off a wave of panic among confused employers, students and workers in the United States and abroad.