EVER since US President Donald Trump entered the White House earlier this year, a huge faction of his Maga follower base has been demanding that he crack down on immigration. Trump has not wasted any time to give his people what they want. The first six months of his administration have seen mass deportations, changes to the birthright citizenship policy and the rounding up of people who have overstayed their visa.

The US recently initiated a pilot programme where even those applying for certain B category visas will have to post a bond that is anywhere from $5,000-$15,000. Applicants would have to post the bond before their visa was stamped. If they do not overstay their visa, the money would be returned. Naturally, such a policy means that travel to the US would be limited to increasingly smaller numbers of people.

The administration has also turned its attention to the H-1B work visa. The politics around this is important. Many among the Maga hard hitters have qualms about this visa because they see America-born workers losing out on high-skilled jobs on account of it. Some reports have stated that H-1B workers, on average, are making less than what US-born workers do, which anti-immigrant advocates say brings down wages for Americans. This visa has also drawn particular attention because Stephen Miller — a special adviser to Trump and the architect of his immigration policy — has targeted the visa structure, which has particularly benefited Indians. In 2022-2023, Indians are reported to have received 72.3 per cent of all H-1B visas. Most of these visas went to people working in the tech sector.

The anti-H-1B visa camp has swung into action.

As the critics have pointed out, spouses of H-1B workers are also allowed to work in the US. There are few restrictions on the holders of this visa. Maga supporters see Indians using this entire visa architecture to come to the US and take away jobs from Americans and bring down the wages of those with jobs in the same area.

It is no surprise then that the anti-H-1B camp has swung into action even as the US-India trade war has heated up in the past few days. At a press conference, Miller stated: “India portrays itself as being one of our closest friends in the world; but they don’t accept our products, they impose massive tariffs on us, we also know they engage in a lot of cheating on immigration policy.” These words appear to suggest that changes to the H-1B programme are set to be another front in the trade war against India and that powerful people in the administration see no problem in shutting out Indian workers from the US tech sector.

Some of this has to do with the evolving business models in Silicon Valley. Traditionally, tech firms have stressed keeping H-1B visa programmes as they are so that they can continue to hire engineers at relatively cheap rates. However, new business models that are increasingly integrating AI into their business operations are finding less need for tech workers in the numbers that were required before. It is also true that the US is producing engineers that can do these jobs. When the latter get jobs, it is a plus for the Trump administration that can boast about having created jobs for American workers.

Many believe that the high numbers of Indians on H-1Bs makes the US somehow dependent on India. This may have been true — until the advent of AI and the increasing political pressure to create jobs for American workers. Add to this, the increasing rancour between Trump and India and it was inevitable that the programme wou­ld face the changes that have been an­­­nounced.

According to the new rules, the current lottery system is going to be repl­aced by a weighted system that prio-ritises higher-paid em­ployees, which in turn, will benefit AI firms paying higher salaries. There will be fewer visas available for entry-level workers, unless of course companies pay them big amounts.

In effect, the new mechanism will make foreign workers very expensive and thus disincentivise prospective employers from hiring them if the vacancy can be filled by American employees. It also suggests that employers will face greater scrutiny and restrictions in the way visas are given out. The fact that all applicants have to have in-person interviews may also delay the process. As one analyst put it, the new H-1B visa is going to be a luxury work visa that only the richest of companies can afford. The proposed rules do not require congressional approval.

The new H-1B visa is going to severely restrict Indians getting tech jobs in the US. Ironically, while the trade disagreements between the US and India may be sorted out, the change in H-1Bs will curb Indian immigration to the US.

The writer is an attorney teaching constitutional law and political philosophy.
rafia.zakaria@gmail.com

Published in Dawn, August 16th, 2025