News Alert! SAAJCO Files First Lawsuit To Block $100,000 H-1B Fee

India Currents ^ | India Currents

[where's_the_Outrage?]

A coalition of labor unions, health care providers, schools, and religious organizations filed suit today (October 3) to stop President Trump’s latest anti-immigration power grab: a sweeping executive action that slaps an unlawful new $100,000 price tag on every new H-1B application. The proclamation – issued on September 19, 2025, and made effective just 36 hours later – has already thrown employers, workers, and federal agencies into chaos.

Plaintiffs are represented by Democracy Forward, Justice Action Center, South Asian American Justice Collaborative (SAAJCO), Kuck Baxter LLC, Joseph & Hall, P.C., and IMMpact Litigation.

“South Asians make up the majority of H-1B workers and are part of the fabric of America, staffing rural hospitals, advancing lifesaving research, and driving innovation in businesses across the country. This unlawful fee threatens workers, their families, and the financial and social wellbeing of the communities in which they live,” said Kalpana V. Peddibhotla, Executive Director of the South Asian American Justice Collaborative.

The H-1B visa program was created by Congress to provide a critical path for the United States to attract highly skilled professionals from around the world to fill urgent needs in the economy and public services to strengthen American innovation. Under the program, U.S. employers can hire qualified foreign talent — such as doctors, nurses, engineers, teachers, and researchers — after a rigorous review process.

The lawsuit, Global Nurse Force et al v. Trump et al., filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, challenges the order as unconstitutional and unlawful under the Administrative Procedure Act.

Plaintiffs include Global Nurse Force; Global Village Academy Collaborative; Society of the Divine Word; the Fathers of St. Charles; Church on the Hill; International Union; United Automobile, Aerospace and Agricultural Implement Workers of America (UAW International); UAW Local

[where's_the_Outrage?]

Now why would the UAW, SEIU, etc. and other "American" based agencies be for importing foreigners instead of employing Americans? Follow the money.

[ComputerGuy]

...latest anti-immigration power grab...

[marcusmaximus]

The plaintiffs have no standing. They and their lawyers need to be deported to India, too for wasting our time.

[Bikkuri]

Send the unions to India too.......

[ComputerGuy]

Where computer software is concerned, the H1B program is not, and never really has been, solely about talent.
Its main offering for employers was cheaper labor.
When it’s all said and done, no one writes code like American boys.

[DuncanWaring]

... staffing rural hospitals, advancing lifesaving research, and driving innovation in businesses across the country.

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If they’re that good, why doesn’t India want them back home, doing all those wonderful things, back in India?

[nathanbedford]

The thrust of this complaint and most complaints against the action of the Trump administration today cite alleged misappropriation of powers belonging to Congress.

The fact that we are in the midst of a government shutdown today illustrates that we are at the mercy of a thoroughly dysfunctional Article I branch, leaving the ship of state otherwise adrift unless the president takes the Helm.

We see this fecklessness of Congress in virtually every important issue: immigration, budgeting, visas, tariffs and associated efforts to stimulate the economy and close the budget deficit. In each instance, President Trump has stepped into the breach.

The Supreme Court must decide whether a very real shift of power running to the president is compatible with the Constitution. If the court concludes that the president has behaved ultra virus his authority, it might restore the Constitution, even as it enables the economic destruction of the Republic.

The better solution is a conservative Congress representing the will of the people in cooperation with an energetic chief executive operating within his sphere. Perhaps in the next election.

[ComputerGuy]

You’re right. Trump is having to take it to the limit.
And then some, maybe.

[Liz]

... Indian here on visas staff rural hospitals, advancing lifesaving
research, and driving innovation in businesses across the country..........

“If they’re THAT good, why doesn’t India want them
doing all those wonderful things, back in India?”

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Indian officials getting kickbacks?

[blitz128]

Sounds like a nice list of organizations that need their financials investigated🤔

[Flavious_Maximus]

“Kalpana V. Peddibhotla”

Yet another filthy scum Dalit. Get them all out and stay out. And deport the ones that are still here. /spit

[Liz]

For decades, Indian students arriving in the US on F1 student visas found jobs with American companies willing to sponsor them for H1-B visas and subsequently, for employment- based green cards......snatching jobs from qualified Americans.

The visa pathway became the basis of the “Indian-American dream;” India’s 5-million strong diaspora set down roots in America. Now, after Trump’s $100,000 H1B visa decision, many in the diaspora believe that pathway is fundamentally broken.

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Too bad.

[Celtic Conservative]

“Unlawful”

Quote chapter and verse about how it’s “unlawful” or STFU.

CC

[blitz128]

Muck like most illegals from south of the border and elsewhere, their countries depend on reparations from those illegals

[mewzilla]

I live in Upstate NYS.

Since CoupFlu I have had 6 providers leave my health system.

1 retirement, the rest have gone elsewhere.

I haven’t seen an American born and trained doc in years.

I get to see one this month for a minor procedure.

After a four month wait.

Nobody wants to stay here or move here except the imports.

We still need medical care.

What are we supposed to do.

Our state government has us by the throat.

[ProtectOurFreedom]

“South Asians make up the majority of H-1B workers and are part of the fabric of America, staffing rural hospitals, advancing lifesaving research, and driving innovation in businesses across the country. This unlawful fee threatens workers, their families, and the financial and social wellbeing of the communities in which they live,”

Sounds like strong justification for them to stay in India and improve their own country.

[normbal]

“ When it’s all said and done, no one writes code like American boys.”

They have AI doing that now, or so I’ve read.

[FLT-bird]

No standing. Dismissed.

[Pete Dovgan]

It’s “unlawful” to charge for the visa?

Why?

[Empire_of_Liberty]

Labor-less America’s Unions.

I think that it’s been a while since America’s government ran the way you are imagining. It is hard to take time to read the Constitution when you’re lining your own pockets. The Congress has been dysfunctional for decades.

Also, to use a phrase like, “ultra vires”, you are going to have to fight with spell-checker, or risk confusing everyone.