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Firms urge employees to return amid visa fee confusion

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Trump's visa fee order causes panic among H-1B holders

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Debate over H-1B visa program's impact on U.S. labor

market

By Aditya Soni and Echo Wang

SAN FRANCISCO/NEW YORK, Sept 21 (Reuters) - Panic,

confusion and anger reigned as workers on H-1B visas from India

and China were forced to abandon travel plans and rush back to

the U.S. after President Donald Trump imposed new visa fees, in

line with his wide-ranging immigration crackdown.

Tech companies and banks sent urgent memos to employees,

advising them to return before a deadline of 12:01 a.m. EDT on

Sunday (0401 GMT), and telling them not to leave the country.

A White House official on Saturday clarified that the order

applied only to new applicants and not holders of existing visas

or those seeking renewals, addressing some of the confusion over

who would be affected.

But Trump's proclamation a day before had already set off

alarm bells in Silicon Valley.

RUSH BACK TO U.S.

Fearing they would not be allowed back once the new rule

took effect, several Indian nationals at San Francisco airport

said they cut short vacations.

"It is a situation where we had to choose between family and

staying here," said an engineer at a large tech company whose

wife had been on an Emirates flight from San Francisco to Dubai

that was scheduled to depart at 5:05 p.m. local time on Friday

(0005 GMT on Saturday)

The flight was delayed by more than three hours after

several Indian passengers who received news of the order or

memos from their employers demanded to deplane, said the person

who spoke on condition of anonymity. At least five passengers

were eventually allowed off, the engineer said.

A video of the incident was circulating on social media,

showing a few people leaving the plane. Reuters could not

independently verify the veracity of the video.

The engineer's wife, also an H-1B visa holder, chose to head

to India to care for her sick mother.

"It's quite tragic. We have built a life here," he told

Reuters.

On the popular Chinese social media app Rednote, people on

H-1B visas shared their experiences of having to rush back to

the U.S. - in some cases just hours after landing in China or

another country.

"My feelings are a mix of disappointment, sadness, and

frustration," said one woman in a post with a user handle

"Emily's Life in NY."

The woman said she had boarded a United Airlines flight from

New York to Paris, and it started taxiing, but after some

back-and-forth with the airline the captain agreed to return to

the gate to let her off the aircraft.

Feeling what she described to Reuters as "shaken," she

canceled her trip to France, abandoning plans with friends,

including some who were flying in from China, after she received

a letter from her company's lawyers asking employees abroad to

return to the U.S.

Companies including Microsoft ( MSFT ), Amazon ( AMZN ),

Alphabet and Goldman Sachs ( GS ) were among those

that sent urgent emails to their employees with travel

advisories.

Amazon ( AMZN ) gave guidance to staff on Saturday, after clarity

emerged on who would be impacted, that no action was required

for staff currently holding H-1B visas, according to a source

who had viewed an internal portal. Amazon ( AMZN ) did not immediately

respond to a request for comment outside business hours.

As of Sunday, some of the panic had dissipated, said IBM ( IBM )

Vice Chairman Gary Cohn, on CBS's "Face the Nation"

program.

"I think it caused a panic over the weekend because people

weren't sure what was going on with the existing H-1B visas,"

said Cohn. "It's been cleaned up over the weekend, so at this

point, there's not a panic in the system."

Cohn praised the move as ultimately good for the economy.

"I actually think this is a good idea, if you understand the

H-1B visa program in the United States," Cohn said.

"Historically, it has been a lottery system."

The new policy also drew support from Netflix ( NFLX ) Chairman

Reed Hastings, who said in a social media post it will eliminate

the need for the lottery and provide more certainty for those

who get the H-1B visas.

Netflix ( NFLX ) was not immediately available for comment.

TRUMP'S U-TURN ON H-1B

Since taking office in January, Trump has kicked off a

wide-ranging immigration crackdown, including moves to limit

some forms of legal immigration.

This step to reshape the H-1B visa program represents his

administration's most visible effort yet to rework temporary

employment visas and underscores what critics have said is a

protectionist agenda.

It is a U-turn from Trump's earlier stance when he sided with

one-time ally and Tesla CEO Elon Musk in a public

dispute over the use of the H-1B visa, saying he fully backed

the program for foreign tech workers even though it was opposed

by some of his supporters.

Trump administration officials say the visa allows companies

to suppress wages, and curbing it opens more jobs for U.S. tech

workers. Supporters of the program argue that it brings in

highly skilled workers essential to filling talent gaps and

keeping firms competitive.

In the hours following Trump's proclamation, social media

was flooded with debate on the scope of the order and dismay at

what many saw as a move that dimmed the United States' allure as

a work destination.

An anonymous user on Rednote said that their life was like

that of an "H-1B slave." The person cut short a holiday in Tokyo

to rush back to the U.S., describing it as "a real-life 'Fast &

Furious' return to the U.S.," a reference to the hit Hollywood

film series about street racing.

Trump's H-1B proclamation read: "Some employers, using

practices now widely adopted by entire sectors, have abused the

H-1B statute and its regulations to artificially suppress wages,

resulting in a disadvantageous labor market for American

citizens."

The secretary of Homeland Security, Kristi Noem, could

exempt petitioners from the fee at her discretion, the

proclamation said.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said on Friday that

companies would have to pay $100,000 per year for H-1B worker

visas.

However, White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said in a

post on X on Saturday that this was not an annual fee, only a

one-time fee that applied to each petition.

A Nvidia ( NVDA ) engineer, who has lived in the U.S. for 10

years, told Reuters at the San Francisco airport that he had

been vacationing in Japan with his wife and infant when he

rushed to reschedule his return flight after hearing the news.

"It feels surreal," he said. "Everything is changing in an

instant."

(Reporting by Aditya Soni in San Francisco and Echo Wang in New

York; Additional reporting by Bhargav Acharya in Toronto, Surbhi

Misra in Bengaluru and Chris Prentice in New York; Writing by

Sayantani Ghosh; Editing by Megan Davies, Michael Perry, Mark

Porter, Matthew Lewis and Chizu Nomiyama )