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Columbia University could face a substantial financial impact if the Trump administration’s proposed $100,000 fee on H-1B visas is implemented, as reported by the Columbia Spectator. The fee, announced in a White House proclamation on September 19, 2025, could cost the University up to $20 million annually, according to data from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). While current H-1B visa holders and renewals are not affected, new visa petitions filed after September 21 would be subject to the levy, placing additional strain on universities that rely heavily on international talent for research and teaching. New H-1B hires could...

“I have never seen anything like this in 30 years,” says Mrinalini Batra, a higher studies counsellor who has helped dozens of Indian students find their way into America’s most prestigious universities. Batra is referring to a slew of measures enacted by the US President Donald Trump administration in recent months, from time-limiting foreign student visas and hiking H1B visa fees to demanding a 15% cap on international students at US universities. Taken together, the measures seem to mark a concerted effort to restrict the number of foreign students entering America. -snip- “The US is just not an option for...

The notification pinged on smartphones across America on Friday, September 19, night. US President Donald Trump had signed a proclamation that would add a staggering $100,000 fee to H1B visa applications, sending shockwaves through the Indian Diaspora that forms the backbone of America's tech industry. For Priya and her husband Rajesh (names changed on request), the news arrived like a digital earthquake in their quiet suburban home. She, on an H4 dependent visa, watched helplessly as her husband -- an H1B holder with three years remaining on his current visa -- absorbed the implications of what seemed like a career-ending...

The number of Indians securing US student visas has witnessed a dramatic plunge, diving by over 44 per cent in August 2025, according to data released on Monday. This marks the steepest drop among all countries and signals a major shift in global student mobility trends, with China now surpassing India as the leading source of US student visas. The International Trade Commission reported that the US issued a total of 313,138 student visas in August — a critical month for university admissions — which reflects a 19.1 per cent decline compared to the previous year. India, which was the...

Chipmaker Nvidia's CEO Jensen Huang said that the company will continue to sponsor H-1B visas and cover all associated costs following U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order last month that imposed a $100,000 fee on each new application, Business Insider reported on Tuesday. Huang's reported message, aimed at reassuring employees, comes after panic and confusion had ensued among tech workers on H-1B visas, a large chunk of whom are from India and China. Akin to the wider chip and tech industry, Nvidia has a significant number of employees from overseas. Huang has repeatedly asserted that about half the AI researchers...

Manisha Puppala, an Indian national who recently graduated with a master’s degree in tech management from the Rochester Institute of Technology, planned to apply for an H-1B work visa to remain in the U.S. after her studies. Now that the Trump administration has announced a $100,000 fee for new H-1B applications, her future is in doubt. Puppala, who took on $120,000 in loans to study in America and has been working at a Boston firm on a permit that allows foreign students to work temporarily in the U.S., had dreamed of running her own startup. “What do I do now?”...

The Trump administration plans to publish a new H-1B rule expected to propose additional immigration restrictions on how employers use the visa and who qualifies for it. Shortly before the White House announced a $100,000 fee on many H-1B visa holders, the Department of Homeland Security published its regulatory agenda. The agenda includes a rule to change the H-1B visa category. The summary for the upcoming rule “Reforming the H-1B Nonimmigrant Visa Classification Program” states: “DHS will propose to reform the H-1B program by revising eligibility for cap exemptions, providing greater scrutiny for employers that have violated program requirements, and...

When Qian Zhang boarded a flight from Shanghai to Boston at age 18, she thought she was heading toward the "best version" of her life. It was 2009, during President Barack Obama's first term, when the U.S. economy was rebounding and opportunities for well-educated workers seemed plentiful. She was bound for Dartmouth College, a top choice for many Chinese students, and later found her way to Harvard Business School. Qian embraced the American dream: the promise of equal opportunity, a country that rewards talent and hard work, and a place where global citizens like her could belong. By her early...

For decades, young Indians were told that success meant heading west. Wealth, global recognition, and a career on the international stage could only be earned by leaving home for the United States. Silicon Valley became the promised land, Wall Street the pinnacle of ambition, and the H1-B visa the golden ticket. Families built dreams around it, students tailored their education for it, and India’s brightest minds set their sights on crossing oceans. But now, that dream faces a harsh reality. President Donald Trump has imposed a staggering $100,000 fee on new H1-B visas, a barrier so steep it threatens to...

There’s been lots of discussion about which tech companies will be the biggest losers from President Donald Trump’s broad assault on H-1B visas for highly skilled foreign workers, including a $100,000 fee for each new visa recipient. But the impact could be felt first by universities, says Jeremy Neufeld, the director of immigration policy at the Institute for Progress, a nonpartisan Washington think tank. That's because the fee won’t apply to companies until next March, when the annual lottery for the roughly 85,000 new commercial H-1B visas awarded each year, takes place. Meanwhile, universities and certain other research and not-for-profit...

Tucker Carlson caused a stir in a recent interview that may cause some Americans to do a double take on the vehicles they are driving. During an interview with automotive designer and internet personality Casey Putsch last week, Tucker mentioned that he is a lifelong fan of Chevrolet trucks but felt he had to “immediately” sell his latest one after spotting a disturbing message on the car’s dashboard. “I bought a truck last year…A Chevy truck, which I’ve always had, and I was at a gas station, he said. “And all of a sudden at a gas station, it says,...

“Are we having a talkshow or a serious conversation?” Vladimir Putin asked Tucker Carlson at the start of their interview on Thursday. By the end of the two-hour conversation, the answer was clear: neither. Instead, viewers got a lesson in Russian history, going all the way back to Prince Rurik – a Scandinavian who came and dished out a good kicking in the region in 862 – and taking in the reign of Yaroslav the Wise, the circa-1300 threat of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and Russia going to war with Poland in the mid-1600s. -snip- “So that you don’t...

Vladimir Putin joked about Tucker Carlson being rejected by the CIA after he finished college during his interview with the conservative polemist—his first with a western journalist since ordering the full invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. The interview was released on Carlson's website and X, formerly Twitter, on Thursday and covered Russian history, the war in Ukraine, NATO, imprisoned American journalist Evan Gershkovich and his relationships with Joe Biden and Donald Trump. During the conversation Putin discussed the 2014 Ukrainian Maidan revolution, which led to the ousting of then pro-Moscow Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, which he claimed took place...

Based on a casual reading of the polls, Donald Trump looks to have smooth sailing to the Republican presidential nomination in 2024 and the chance to erase the stink of losing to Joe Biden that he so covets. But if that’s the case, why does Trump seem so panicky these days? Simple: Trump is in trouble, and — when you dig into the numbers — his grip on the GOP nomination is getting more tenuous. It is Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) who has all the momentum.

Former President Donald Trump delivered his first major speech after leaving office, charting a path forward for the Republican Party and conservatives but suggesting that he might run in 2024.“I may even decide to beat them for the third time,” he said.Trump said the conservative movement he created “is far from being over” but did not declare that he would try to run against for president in 2024. “There’s never been a journey more successful,” he remarked, adding that conservatives “will be victorious and stronger and greater than ever before.”“The future of the Republican Party is as a party that...

I shouted for job when Obama defeated this jerk. It's even more sweet to look back on it, now that he's trying to torpedo Trump. He is an everlasting ASS, and it is so good to be reminded of how he had his ass handed to him by Obama. All you who defended him and voted for him, (and probably were among the Bush-backers as well), I hope you have finally WOKEN UP. The GOP Establishment is NOT ON YOUR SIDE.

Being a hardcore constitutionalist, conservative, agnostic AND supporter of gay-marriage is not always easy. I usually take a lot of heat from both sides, and I'm used to that. With the Chick-Fil-A situation, I see both sides of the issue. I support CFA and I support the idea of gay marriage. What I don't support are the tactics used by the left to bully, intimidate, mock, deride and create false narratives to achieve their goal. I'm angry at the left for creating hatred. I see and hear a lot of it because I have so many gay and liberal friends,...

Sorry but i have read so many topics about the so called socialized health care that i don´t get it at all. For me (european) it just looks like both "sides" are just lying 24/7. For example the "democrats" try to pick up the best of european health care and try to tell every one that its like this is all the way. And the republicans pick up the negative sides of different european countries and try to portray it like it would be all the same.btw. Don´t get me wrong. Both factors exist in some form but both are...

Microsoft's row with Korean regulators could boost Linux in Asia, the region's first listed Linux developer told vnunet.com today. "It should definitely have a positive public relations impact for us," said Nobu Okada, chief financial officer at Turbolinux, a Japan-based Linux developer that carried out a successful IPO in September. Microsoft said that it might stop selling Windows in Korea if regulators demand a rewrite of the operating system's code to remove certain features. As regulators from the Korea Fair Trade Commission (KFTC) met to discuss a ruling in an antitrust case aimed at Microsoft, the president of Microsoft Korea,...

IBM today announced free software and educational resources to help developers in Russia build and deploy innovative applications based on open standards and open source. Tapping into the booming software development market in Russia, IBM is giving software developers, architects and students free access to software and hundreds of new tools and technical and educational resources that will enable them to more easily build open standards-based applications. With a few clicks of a mouse, developers can download free versions of IBM middleware, IBM WebSphere Application Server Community Edition and IBM DB2 Universal Database Express-C, as well as access trial code,...