USCIS collected just 85 payments of its new $100,000 H-1B fee by mid-February, a government filing told a federal court1. Within the year, OpenAI and Anthropic had filed far more H-1B paperwork than before2. Amazon, Google and Microsoft had filed fewer. A fee built to shrink skilled immigration across tech instead picked winners inside it.
A fee that barely got collected
President Trump signed the proclamation on Sept. 19, 20253. It set a $100,000 charge on new H-1B petitions4. The charge applies only to workers who still live outside the country. It skips any worker who already lives here and just changes visa status.
USCIS keeps its own record of every petition, back to fiscal 2009, in an employer data hub5. The hub supplies most of the numbers below.
Collection fell far short of the size of the number. A filing told a federal court that USCIS had received only 85 payments, worth $8.5 million, by mid-February1. The low count left employers guessing which hires were worth a six-figure bet.
Who kept hiring, and who pulled back
Federal filings explain why the fee split the industry instead of shrinking it evenly. Anthropic's certified H-1B applications rose from 10 to 59 in a year, a 490 percent jump2. OpenAI's rose from 20 to 63 over the same stretch, up 215 percent. Nvidia's climbed from 641 to 765, a smaller 19 percent rise.
Those are Labor Condition Applications. An employer certifies each one with the Department of Labor before it can file an actual H-1B petition. A company that triples its LCAs can still end up hiring fewer workers than that. The filings are still the earliest public signal of intent.
Anthropic's H-1B Filings Rise 490 Percent While Google's Fall 64 Percent
Change in certified H-1B labor condition applications, second quarter fiscal 2025 to second quarter fiscal 2026
Each bar is one company's percent change in certified H-1B applications over a year; magenta bars are AI labs filing more, gray bars are Big Tech filing less.
A labor condition application is the step before an actual H-1B petition, and small base counts at Anthropic and OpenAI make their percentages swing further than Nvidia's or Big Tech's.
Sources: BusinessToday [2]; GlanceJobs [6]. Chart by Ryan Elliott Dennis.
The numbers behind this chart
| Item | Value |
|---|---|
| Anthropic | 490% |
| OpenAI | 215% |
| Nvidia | 19% |
| Meta | −3% |
| Microsoft | −20% |
| Amazon | −30% |
| −64% |
Big Tech moved the other way. Google's certified applications fell 64 percent across the same comparison2. Amazon's fell 30 percent and Microsoft's fell 20 percent. Meta barely moved, down just 3 percent.
Amazon's raw numbers show the scale behind that percentage. Its certified applications fell from 4,647 in the first quarter of fiscal 2025 to 3,057 a year later7. A Business Insider review of federal data set those figures. "Companies are being more selective in who they sponsor," immigration lawyer Jason Finkelman told the outlet.
Go back a year, to the fiscal year the fee began. Amazon already led the country in approved H-1B petitions for new hires: 4,6444. Meta had 1,555, Microsoft 1,394 and Google 1,050, a National Foundation for American Policy review of USCIS data found. Amazon, Meta, Microsoft and Google held the top four spots for the first time on record.
The case for the fee
Supporters call the fee a tool against abuse. The administration says some companies used H-1B hires to replace American staff with cheaper labor3. It built its enforcement push around stopping that practice.
Vice President JD Vance made the argument blunt on X. "We're not going to let you lay off American workers so you can replace them with cheap foreign labor," he wrote on Sept. 24, 20268.
JD Vance@JDVanceOur message to corporate America is simple: We’re not going to let you lay off American workers so you can replace them with cheap foreign labor.https://t.co/Ct7CGfaGDp
The administration paired that message with a new instruction. Officials reviewing H-1B petitions must now weigh whether the sponsoring employer recently laid off similar American workers3.
Even some AI executives came around. OpenAI's chief executive, Sam Altman, said that aligning financial incentives around skilled visas "seems good" to him9.
The case against it
Lawyers who file these petitions see a narrower effect: pricing out exactly the employers least able to pay. "A $100,000 fee for H-1B petitions would be devastating to several industries as it would significantly prohibit the hiring of foreign national talent in this visa classification," said Mike Sevilla, an immigration attorney at Dorsey & Whitney10.
Startup founders made the same point within days of the fee's signing. "The impact will be severe on the competitiveness and innovation of smaller startups compared to the hyperscales, the big businesses," said Amr Awadallah, founder of the AI company Vectara11.
Nvidia's chief executive carries a version of the same argument inside his own family history. Jensen Huang told CNBC in October 2025 that the fee, at today's price, would have kept his own parents from immigrating decades ago9. "I don't think that my family would have been able to afford the $100,000, and so the opportunity for my family and for me to be here … would not have been possible," Huang said. Huang still backs Trump's broader crackdown on skilled visas, which makes his own exception stand out.
Economists warn the fee pushes jobs overseas instead of home. Wharton's Britta Glennon studied earlier H-1B denials and found companies hired abroad instead4. "When U.S. firms are denied H-1Bs, they go abroad, setting up new foreign affiliates and hiring talent there instead of in the U.S.," Glennon said. "For the most global multinational companies, this is at almost a 1:1 rate."
Judges split on the fee
Federal judges have split three ways on the fee. Judge Beryl Howell in Washington upheld it on Dec. 23, 2025, rejecting a U.S. Chamber of Commerce challenge12.
Judge Leo Sorokin in Massachusetts vacated the fee on June 8, 202613. He ruled it functioned as a tax, one the executive branch lacked the power to impose alone. The First Circuit Court of Appeals refused to pause that ruling on July 24, 202612. USCIS confirmed it would comply.
Two Courts Block Trump's H-1B Fee Within a Year of Its Signing
Key dates in the $100,000 H-1B fee's legal fight, September 2025 to September 2026
Each pin is one dated event in the fee's legal fight; magenta pins mark a court blocking the fee, gray pins mark the administration's own actions.
Sources: The White House [3]; Ahluwalia Law [12]; Clark Hill [13]. Chart by Ryan Elliott Dennis.
The numbers behind this chart
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| Sept. 19, 2025 | Trump signs the fee |
| Dec. 23, 2025 | D.C. court upholds it |
| June 8, 2026 | Mass. court vacates it |
| July 24, 2026 | 1st Circuit keeps block |
| Sept. 18, 2026 | Trump extends to 2027 |
| Sept. 30, 2026 | Calif. court blocks it |
Trump had stretched the fee's proclamation through September 2027 on Sept. 18, 2026. A California court invalidated that extension on Sept. 30, 2026, twelve days later12.
What to do
Track which employer signs your next H-1B offer. A company already sponsoring dozens of H-1B workers a year can likely absorb the fee, if courts let it stand again. Smaller sponsors, the ones that file for one or two H-1B workers a year, probably have a harder time planning around it.
Watch the Ninth Circuit case if your offer depends on a worker who still lives abroad. A reversal there could revive the fee within weeks. The filing window for new petitions would tighten fast.
By the numbers
- $100,000: the fee Trump's Sept. 19, 2025 proclamation set on new H-1B petitions filed from outside the country3.
- 85 payments: what USCIS had collected, worth $8.5 million, by mid-February1.
- 59: Anthropic's certified H-1B applications in the quarter after the fee, up from 10 a year earlier2.
- 63: OpenAI's H-1B filings over the same stretch, up from 202.
- 64 percent: the drop in Google's H-1B filings over the same comparison2.
- 4,644: Amazon's approved H-1B petitions for new hires in fiscal 2025, the most of any employer4.
- 3: federal courts that have ruled on the fee, two against it and one for it12.
What to watch
Watch the Ninth Circuit's ruling on California's case, the one most likely to decide whether the fee returns12. USCIS's next quarterly data release, due in January, will show whether AI labs keep outpacing Big Tech once the court fights settle5.
Sources
- Paul Wiseman, "What to know about Trump's $100,000 H-1B visa fee, and the legal rebuke that followed," PBS NewsHour / The Associated Press, June 11, 2026, https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/what-to-know-about-trumps-100000-h-1b-visa-fee-and-the-legal-rebuke-that-followed
- BusinessToday Desk, "Why AI firms like Anthropic, OpenAI are filing for more H-1B visas even while Big Tech cos pulled back," BusinessToday, June 10, 2026, https://www.businesstoday.in/nri/visa/story/why-ai-firms-like-anthropic-openai-are-filing-for-more-h-1b-visas-even-while-big-tech-cos-pulled-back-535816-2026-06-10
- The White House, "Fact Sheet: President Donald J. Trump Further Enhances Program Integrity and Interagency Coordination in the H-1B Visa Program," Sept. 18, 2026, https://www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets/2026/09/fact-sheet-president-donald-j-trump-further-enhances-program-integrity-and-interagency-coordination-in-the-h-1b-visa-program/
- National Foundation for American Policy, "New Research: Top Technology Companies Receive Most New H-1B Petitions in FY 2025," Nov. 17, 2025, https://nfap.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/H-1B-Petitions-and-Denial-Rates-FY-2025.DAY-OF-RELEASE.2025.pdf
- USCIS, "H-1B Employer Data Hub," U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, https://www.uscis.gov/tools/reports-and-studies/h-1b-employer-data-hub
- GlanceJobs Team, "AI Labs Are Filing More H-1Bs While Amazon, Google, and Microsoft Pull Back: The FY 2026 Split," GlanceJobs, Sept. 30, 2026, https://glancejobs.com/news/openai-nvidia-h1b-filings-rise-amazon-google-pull-back-fy2026/
- Business Insider, "Big Tech H-1B Filings Plunge As Amazon, Google, Meta And Microsoft Slash Jobs Amid Rising Immigration Costs," via Yahoo Finance, April 3, 2026, https://finance.yahoo.com/sectors/technology/articles/big-tech-h-1b-filings-113109325.html
- JD Vance, "Our message to corporate America is simple: We're not going to let you lay off American workers so you can replace them with cheap foreign labor," X, Sept. 24, 2026, https://x.com/JDVance/status/2103119477240168589
- Jacqueline Munis, "OpenAI and Nvidia CEOs didn't flinch at Trump's $100,000 H-1B visa fee, and now they're paying up as their application numbers soar," Fortune, June 10, 2026, https://fortune.com/2026/06/10/sam-altman-jensen-huang-h1b-visa-fee-application-numbers-trump-lawsuit/
- Billal Rahman, "H-1B Visa Fees Will Hit Startups: Immigration Attorney," Newsweek, Sept. 25, 2025, https://www.newsweek.com/h-1b-visa-fees-startups-immigration-attorney-10479633
- Dominic-Madori Davis, "Startup founders say Trump's $100K H-1B fee is a 'talent tariff' that will hurt innovation," TechCrunch, Sept. 25, 2025, https://techcrunch.com/2025/09/25/startup-founders-say-trumps-100k-h-1b-fee-is-a-talent-tariff-that-will-hurt-innovation
- Ahluwalia Law, "What Is Happening to the $100,000 H-1B Fee? Where Things Stand in November 2026," Nov. 5, 2026, https://www.ahluwalialaw.com/what-is-happening-to-the-100000-h-1b-fee-where-things-stand-in-november-2026/
- Nina Chaladze, "Federal Court Vacates $100,000 H-1B Visa Fee," Clark Hill, June 9, 2026, https://www.clarkhill.com/news-events/news/h1b-fee-struck-down-massachusetts-court-2026/
