Judge Blocks New H-1B Fee

OAKLAND, California — U.S. District Judge Haywood S. Gilliam Jr. on 30 September issued a preliminary injunction that stops federal agencies from enforcing President Donald Trump’s $100,000 payment requirement on certain new H-1B visas, marking the second time a federal trial court has frozen the policy.

The order in Global Nurse Force v. Trump prevents U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Customs and Border Protection, and the State Department from implementing sections of a presidential proclamation that required employers filing an H-1B petition for a worker outside the United States to pay $100,000. Gilliam held that the plaintiffs were likely to succeed on claims that the agencies skipped proper notice-and-comment rulemaking under the Administrative Procedure Act and related small-business analysis under the Regulatory Flexibility Act.

A preliminary injunction is a temporary court order. It keeps the agencies from collecting the proclamation-based payment while the lawsuit continues, unless a higher court or later order changes the picture. It is not a final judgment that the fee can never return through lawful channels.

What the H-1B program is

The H-1B visa lets U.S. employers temporarily hire foreign professionals in specialty occupations — typically jobs that need at least a bachelor’s degree in a specific field, such as nursing, teaching, engineering, or religious ministry. Demand usually exceeds the annual numerical cap, so many petitions go through a lottery. Workers abroad often need consular processing or admission at a port of entry after a petition is approved.

Trump first imposed the $100,000 fee in a September 2025 proclamation. A federal court in Massachusetts blocked that fee in June 2026; the First Circuit left that injunction in place. In August, the Department of Homeland Security proposed a separate rule that would create a large fee through ordinary regulation. Last month Trump extended the original proclamation for another year through Proclamation 11069. Gilliam’s order addresses the proclamation-based payment and agency memos implementing it, not every future fee DHS might finalize after public comment.

Who sued and what employers face now

Plaintiffs include healthcare, education, and religious organizations and groups that say H-1B workers fill shortages of nurses, teachers, language instructors, and pastoral staff. They argued the overnight fee disrupted planning and exceeded what Congress authorized. The government said the program has been abused, displaces American workers, and raises national-security concerns.

For employers, the practical effect of the California order — stacked on the Massachusetts block — is that the proclamation-based $100,000 payment is not currently being enforced for covered petitions, including cases that need consular processing from abroad. DHS has separately proposed a $103,265 fee for certain cap-subject H-1B petitions through notice-and-comment rulemaking; that proposal is not yet a final rule and is not what Gilliam enjoined. A case-management conference in the California suit is set for late October.