A U.S. federal court has ruled to cancel Donald Trump's order to raise the H-1B high-skilled worker visa fee to $100,000, stating that the U.S. president does not have the authority to impose such a fee.
On Monday, 8 Jun 2026 GMT+7, a U.S. federal judge ordered the repeal of the $100,000 fee that President Donald Trump imposed on new H-1B visa applicants for highly skilled foreign workers. The court concluded that this fee was an unlawful tax that never received Congressional approval.
Leo Sorokin, a U.S. District Court judge in Boston, issued the ruling in a lawsuit filed by attorneys general from 20 Democratic states. They jointly opposed the fee Trump announced in September 2025, which drastically increased the cost of applying for H-1B visas.
Supporters of the policy argued that the fee was a lawful financial penalty within the president’s authority under federal immigration law, which grants the leader power to restrict entry of certain foreign nationals if their entry is deemed "detrimental to the interests of the United States."
However, Judge Sorokin's decision stated that the amount is not a penalty but a "tax" that the Republican president lacked Congressional authorization to impose, and that the State Department and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) cannot enforce it.
"In this case, the substance and enforcement of the $100,000 payment clearly show it is a tax, regardless of what it is called," Judge Sorokin, appointed by former Democratic President Barack Obama, wrote in his ruling.
Additionally, the judge referenced a U.S. Supreme Court decision from February that struck down Trump's broad customs tax imposed under the National Emergency Act. Sorokin noted that under the logic of that Supreme Court ruling, Trump similarly lacked authority under immigration law to levy such a tax.
Taylor Rogers, a White House spokeswoman, said in a statement that the Trump administration remains confident that Judge Sorokin’s ruling will be overturned on appeal.
The H-1B visa program allocates 65,000 visas annually for highly skilled foreign workers, plus another 20,000 for those with advanced degrees. Approved applicants may work in the U.S. for three to six years, with technology companies especially reliant on H-1B visa workers.
Previously, employers seeking H-1B visas for foreign workers paid fees ranging from about $2,000 to $5,000, depending on various factors, until Trump’s order raised the fee to $100,000 in September last year.
The fee increase led to a sharp decline in H-1B visa applications, according to court documents. The government stated in a March filing that as of 15 February, USCIS had collected only 85 payments of the $100,000 fee.
Moreover, the Trump administration tightened background checks for H-1B applicants and proposed a new selection process favoring higher-skilled, higher-paid workers, triggering at least three lawsuits opposing the implementation.
Follow international news:https://www.thairath.co.th/news/foreign
Source:cna