Trump to announce new H-1B visa curbs with fewer exclusions

The United States (US) President Donald Trump has said that he would be announcing new visa restrictions and other temporary work permits soon. Trump said he would be signing an Executive Order introducing restrictions on H-1B, H-2B, L-1 and J-1 visas to help local employment and curb immigration in the country.

He didn't provide any details but acknowledged there will be some exclusions. Trump said these restrictions would make a lot of people happy and would have fewer exclusions.

"In some cases, you have to have exclusions because in some cases you have to have them for big business that have had certain people coming for a very long time, but very little exclusions and they are pretty tight," reports Fox News quoting POTUS.

Trump added, "We may even go very tight for a big period of time. The US has been dealing with high unemployment rates following business closures on account of the Covid19 pandemic."

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This move by the US government would impact thousands of Indians scheduled to go to the US on October 1, if their petitions are approved. This would also be Trump's latest step to restrict immigration in the US. In April, he temporarily halted the issuance of US green cards to a few foreigners.

H-1B visas are for skilled workers - those employed in science, engineering, and information technology fields -, while H-2B visas are offered to seasonal workers like hotel and construction staff.

L-1 visas, on the other hand, are for executives working for large corporations and J-1 visas are given to work-exchange programs, professors, research scholars, and other cultural programmes.

In 2019, seven of the top ten recipients of H-1B visas were the US firms. The share of Indian firms among the top ten visa recipients has also plunged from 51 per cent to 24 per cent from 2016 to 2019, according to US Citizenship and Immigration Services data.

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