Attorney General Clark Joins Amicus Brief Opposing Trump Administration's Illegal H-1B $100,000 Fee

Attorney General Charity Clark joined a multistate amicus brief filed today opposing the Trump Administration's unlawful policy imposing a $100,000 fee on new H-1B visa petitions.

H-1B visas allow U.S. employers to hire highly skilled foreign national workers in roles that require specialized skills, including as physicians, researchers, nurses, and teachers, to alleviate nationwide labor shortages. For years, hospitals, public schools, and universities have relied on H-1B workers to address critical unmet labor needs, particularly in rural, low-income, and other underserved areas.

However, in September, President Trump issued a proclamation ordering an unprecedented $100,000 fee for new H-1B visa petitions, undermining the very purpose of the H-1B visa by making it harder to address severe labor shortages in critical fields such as education and health care. As implemented by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) through a series of written documents, the policy affects any application filed after September 21, 2025. The new fee will make it exceedingly difficult for many health care and education employers to hire H-1B workers, undermining their ability to meet patient and student needs and undercutting important scientific and medical research.

As the amicus brief argues, H-1B workers are critical to the economies of the amici states and to addressing employment shortages in key fields. In Vermont, public and private employers rely on the services of hundreds of H-1B visa-holders to fill critical roles in research, health care, education, and technology that would otherwise go unfulfilled.

The amicus brief also argues that the Trump Administration's failure to follow notice-and-comment rulemaking requirements when adopting the exorbitant H-1B fee was unlawful, depriving states of the opportunity to share their concerns about the harms the fee will cause to their economies and to their education and health care systems.

The amicus brief was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California in support of plaintiff Global Nurse Force, which sued the Trump Administration over the $100,000 H-1B visa fee. The multistate amicus brief filed today follows on the heels of a complaint filed by the multistate coalition earlier this month challenging this unlawful fee.

The amicus brief was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. Joining Attorney General Clarkon the brief are the attorneys general of Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawai'i, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Rhode Island, Washington, and Wisconsin.

A copy of the brief is available on our website.

CONTACT: Amelia Vath, Senior Advisor to the Attorney General, 802-828-3171