US President Donald Trump is proposing a fee of over US$100,000 per employee for American companies that employ foreign workers, in a bid to ramp up support from his political base months before the midterm elections.
The move comes on the heels of a US federal judge’s decision earlier this summer to strike down the White House’s previously proposed fee for H-1B visa applications.
The H-1B visa is a non-immigrant US work visa that lets American companies hire foreign workers for specialized jobs.
Indeed, most MAGA (“Make America Great Again”, a campaign slogan used by Trump in the 2016 presidential election) voters see the H-1B visa program with strong scepticism or outright hostility, regarding it as a corporate loophole that undercuts American workers and suppresses local tech-sector wages.
While traditional Republicans often view highly skilled legal immigration favourably, the MAGA base heavily favours an “America First” restriction on both legal and illegal immigration. — Xinhua
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