The Biden Administration has formally rescinded the Trump-era rule[1] that would have replaced the randomized H-1B visa lottery selection process with a system that prioritized the highest paid H-1B applicants first in descending order until the annual H-1B cap was reached.
The Trump rule, which was promulgated but never went into effect, was subject to President Biden’s regulatory “freeze” order. On February 4, 2021, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agency that administers the H-1B visa program, announced that it was delaying the rule until December 31, 2021, “to give USCIS more time to develop, test, and implement the modifications to the H-1B registration system and selection process” and “to train staff and perform public outreach as well as give stakeholders time to adjust to the new rule.”
On December 22, 2021, USCIS published a formal rescission of the Trump rule in the Federal Register. As a result, the H-1B lottery for the upcoming fiscal year (FY) 2023 filing season should look the same as last year.
Members of the Center for Workplace Compliance (CWC) can read more here.