Biden admin removes Trump era rule restricting H-1B applications

As a great relief to the Indian firms, the Joe Biden administration removes a proposed rule which aimed to narrow the definition of specialty occupation, which would restrict who would be eligible to apply for an H-1B work permit. The rule, introduced by the previous Donald Trump administration had not been implemented as it had been vacated by a US court in December last year. A final rule to this effect has been published in the Federal Register on Wednesday. This rule removes the interim final rule (IFR), Strengthening the H-1B Nonimmigrant Visa Classification Program, from the Code of Federal Regulations, Economic Times reported.

According to the report, the IFR, published in October 2020, called to bring about changes in the definitions of ‘third-party worksite, employer-employee relationship and specialty occupation, all of which would have restricted the ability of services companies to place H-1B visa holders at client or third-party worksite, impacting Indian companies. It also called for restricting the educational qualifications required to be eligible for an H-1B visa, which again would have had an adverse impact on Indian applicants.

Every year, the US issues 85,000 new H-1B work visas, about 70% of which go to Indian nationals. In the last few years, the share of visas issued to Indian services companies has dropped significantly, in part on account of stricter visa approval norms, the report said.

Earlier, yesterday a lawsuit challenging the wage based H-1B visa allocation had been filed by five non-profit organisations with a US District Court (District of Columbia).