Companies May Face H-1B Visa Restrictions In An Immigration Bill

Companies will welcome an immigration bill, but not if it includes new restrictions that make H-1B visas unusable for employers. House Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan (R-OH) said he expects Republicans to move immigration legislation this year that would include H-1B visas. If history is a guide, companies will need to fight off restrictive measures. Mandating vastly higher salaries for H-1B visa holders by requiring them to be paid the “median local wage” is among the most likely immigration amendments. Such a requirement would be intended to price many high-skilled foreign nationals out of the U.S. labor market.

Potential Immigration Legislation

Jim Jordan indicated that Congressional Republicans will turn to immigration legislation affecting H-1B visas and other categories after completing the budget reconciliation process. “The Ohio Republican said he is eyeing his party’s flagship immigration bill as the legislative vehicle for overhauling existing laws to increase the flow of immigrants into the United States with expertise in science, technology and engineering,” reported Politico.

House Republicans may entertain increases to H-1B visas, likely because of Elon Musk. Donald Trump’s wealthy political ally has voiced support for admitting more high-skilled foreign nationals. He defended the entry of employment-based immigrants as crucial to the U.S. economy, and Trump chimed in to support him.

According to Politico, “‘I think we got to come back and pass [the bill] and send that to the Senate,’ Jordan explained, at which point both chambers could ‘then start that debate on what happens with various visa programs we have—whether it’s the high-skilled one, whether it’s [agricultural] workers, whether it’s what happens to Dreamers.’ He added that a House-Senate conference committee on that immigration bill would also allow the White House to ‘weigh in’ on high-skilled immigration.”

The chair of the House Judiciary Committee lays out a curious process. “Jordan said, he would expect the H-1B overhaul to come up as one of any number of concessions Republicans might make to sway Democrats in the Senate, who will be needed to clear any legislation for the president’s signature.”

That process might not work well for the business community. While Democrats would seek to protect Dreamers (young people brought to America by their parents), there is no evidence Democrats in the Senate would ask for an increase in H-1B visas. It is more likely that Senate Democrats would enact new restrictions on H-1B visas without increasing the annual limit.

For more than a decade, Sen. Richard Durbin (D-IL), the ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, has cosponsored legislation with Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA) to impose wide-ranging restrictions on the H-1B visa category. More recently, Durbin cosponsored an amendment with Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) to require employers to pay H-1B visa holders far higher than the market wage for comparable U.S. workers.

That measure would have unintentionally encouraged employers to move work out of the United States. In practice, such an amendment would mean companies with approved H-1B petitions might need to pay inflated salaries to both H-1B visa holders and U.S. professionals or risk potential federal civil rights actions. It could also mean some existing H-1B visa holders would become too costly for companies to retain in America.

The Sanders Amendment And The Threat Employers Face On H-1B Visas In An Immigration Bill

In January 2025, Sen. Bernie Sanders offered an amendment to the Laken Riley Act that would have priced recent foreign-born graduates with limited work experience and others out of the U.S. labor market. The amendment was not voted on because Republicans closed the debate on the bill.

According to a National Foundation for American Policy analysis, “If passed, the amendment would have required employers to pay over $80,000 a year more (a 72% increase) than under current law for a recently graduated software developer in San Jose.”

If the Sanders amendment had come to a vote in January, the business community likely lacked a champion to rally votes against it. In 1998, Sen. Spencer Abraham (R-MI), who I worked for, spoke against floor amendments to a bill to increase the H-1B annual limit. Abraham gathered enough support to defeat the amendments, which would have imposed significant new labor requirements on employers.

In addition to government and legal fees, an employer petitioning for an H-1B professional must pay “at least- (I) the actual wage level paid by the employer to all other individuals with similar experience and qualifications for the specific employment in question, or (II) the prevailing wage level for the occupational classification in the area of employment, whichever is greater.” (Emphasis added.)

Sen. Sanders’ amendment would have abolished the prevailing wage as the minimum wage level to pay H-1B visa holders and replaced it with the “higher of the median local wage level or the actual wage of similarly employed workers.”

Using the “median local wage” vastly inflates salary requirements for all but the most experienced professionals. According to the National Survey of College Graduates, the median years since obtaining a degree is 13 years for a software developer and 14 years for electrical and electronics engineers. Sen. Sanders would have required an employer to pay a recent graduate like someone with more than a decade of work experience. The “median local wage” is not a market wage that considers experience level.

If recent graduates of U.S. universities cannot work in the United States, it would deal a significant blow to America’s early-career talent pipeline. Up to 90% of recent international students fall within the two lowest levels of the four prevailing wage levels in the Department of Labor’s system. DOL establishes the prevailing wage by collecting data from the government’s Occupational Employment Statistics wage survey and using a mathematical formula to create four levels of wages for each occupation. The Sanders amendment would have replaced that with a much higher minimum salary.

For a semiconductor (electronics) engineer in the San Jose area, the annual salary would be $75,088 (or 74%) more at the median local wage than at the current prevailing wage level 1 ($176,113 vs. $101,025). The “median local wage” annual salary would be nearly $50,000 higher than the level 2 prevailing wage.

In the Seattle, Dallas and Washington, D.C. areas, employers would be compelled to pay a software developer or electrical engineer 30% to 63% higher than under current law, depending on the level and location, or up to $60,000 more than the prevailing wage.

The H-1B Visa Category Is Already The Most Restrictive In The U.S. Immigration System

The 85,000 H-1B annual ceiling makes gaining permission to sponsor a highly skilled worker often impossible for employers. “The low annual limit on new H-1B petitions makes the category the most restrictive visa in the U.S. immigration system,” according to a National Foundation for American Policy analysis. “In FY 2025, employers filed at least 423,028 eligible H-1B registrations, but USCIS could only allow 85,000 new foreign nationals to obtain H-1B status under the annual limit, an approval rate of only 20%.”

H-1B visas are important because they typically are the only practical way high-skilled foreign nationals, including international students, can work long term in the United States. The 85,000 annual ceiling for new H-1B petitions is low, the equivalent of only 0.05% of the U.S. labor force.

Although only 20% of new H-1B applications turn into approved workers under the 85,000 limit, the U.S. government approved 72% of individuals who applied for visitor visas (B1/B2) in FY 2024 and 89% of J-1 visas, which include exchange visitors such as researchers and summer workers.

According to the NFAP study, “A European teenager is four times more likely to get a visa to work at a summer amusement park than a graduate student is to receive H-1B status to work for a U.S. company on artificial intelligence.”

Immigration legislation could be an opportunity for Congress to enhance the ability of the United States and employers to attract and retain talent, including international students. The legislation could also result in new immigration restrictions imposed on foreign-born scientists and engineers that leave companies worse off than the current law.