Status as of September 19, 2026. A presidential proclamation signed September 18, 2026 extends Proclamation 10973, the 2025 restriction on entry of certain H-1B workers, for another 12 months. The extension takes effect at 12:01 a.m. eastern daylight time on September 21, 2026 and runs until 12:00 a.m. eastern daylight time on September 21, 2027. The $100,000 payment condition it carries forward is separately subject to a federal court order: USCIS states that a district court in Massachusetts ruled against the requirement, that the First Circuit denied the government's request for a stay on July 24, 2026, and that DHS is complying while it considers next steps. A separate executive order signed the same day adds layoff scrutiny and interagency review to H-1B adjudications.
The extension continues the regime established in September 2025 rather than replacing it. Proclamation 10973 was issued on September 19, 2025, took effect on September 21, 2025, and was set to expire after 12 months. The new proclamation preserves the same $100,000 amount and the same basic class of workers covered by the restriction, and carries both through September 21, 2027.
The restriction bars entry of certain H-1B nonimmigrant workers unless the petition was accompanied or supplemented by a payment of $100,000, subject to what the proclamation calls very limited exceptions. Under the exception provision, the Secretary of Homeland Security may exempt an individual, all workers at a company, or an entire industry, on a determination that the hiring is in the national interest and does not pose a threat to the security or welfare of the United States. Both conditions have to be met.
Where the Payment Requirement Stands in Court
The proclamation's text and its present enforceability are two different things, and the distinction is the practical heart of this story. According to USCIS, the payment requirement was litigated in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, the district court's order was administratively stayed while the government sought a stay pending appeal, and on July 24, 2026 the First Circuit denied that motion. USCIS states that DHS disagrees with the order, will comply with it, and still plans to collect the payment if the order is later lifted.
The proclamation does not mention the litigation. It extends the restriction as written; whether the payment condition can be enforced while the appeal proceeds turns on the court order rather than on the proclamation.
What the New Text Changes
The extension is not a word-for-word renewal. Three differences are visible on comparison with the 2025 text.
The new proclamation spells out more explicitly when the entry restriction applies. It states that the restriction reaches workers who must seek admission to effectuate the approval of a covered petition, including through consular notification, notification at a port of entry, pre-flight inspection, or pre-clearance. The 2025 version described the scope more briefly, by reference to the effective date alone.
The 2025 direction to the Secretary of State to issue guidance against misuse of B visas by beneficiaries of approved H-1B petitions with employment start dates before October 1, 2026 does not appear in the new text.
The 2025 proclamation also contained a section directing the Department of Labor and the Department of Homeland Security to initiate rulemakings. That section is absent from the extension, which instead reports on what those two rulemakings have produced.
The Same-Day Executive Order
On September 18, 2026 the President also signed an executive order titled Enhancing Program Integrity and Interagency Coordination in the Administration of the H-1B Nonimmigrant Visa Program. It operates alongside the extension rather than inside it.
The order directs the Secretary of State, the Secretary of Labor, and the Secretary of Homeland Security, when processing petitions, labor condition applications, and visas, to coordinate with the Secretary of Commerce, the Secretary of Education, and the Administrator of the Small Business Administration, who are to supply wage, employment, academic, industrial, and other economic data.
It further directs those three secretaries to take into account whether a sponsoring employer engaged in layoffs, directly or indirectly, within the previous year, or plans layoffs that negatively affect similarly situated U.S. workers. Within 30 days, the Secretary of Labor, through the Administrator of the Wage and Hour Division, is to begin reviewing data from previously submitted labor condition applications to determine whether further action against sponsoring employers is warranted.
What the Proclamation Says It Achieved
The document frames the 2025 restriction as effective and the conditions behind it as unresolved. It reports that the $100,000 payment has been made for over 700 petitions since the original measure took effect.
It also cites changes in filing patterns. Combined H-1B registrations by the largest IT staffing and outsourcing firms fell from 24,946 to 2,055, a 92 percent decrease. Consular processing requests dropped nearly 97 percent between the FY 2025 and FY 2027 cap seasons. Registrations for beneficiaries holding at least a U.S. Master's degree rose from 45.1 percent of total registrants for FY 2026 to 66.1 percent for FY 2027, while job offers at the two highest wage levels accounted for roughly 46.3 percent of selections and the lowest wage level for 17.8 percent.
The proclamation attributes the shift to the combined effect of the payment requirement and the new weighted selection process.
The Labor Market Figures the Document Cites
On the conditions it says justify an extension, the proclamation's own numbers show little movement. Unemployment for recent college graduates stood at 5.7 percent as of June 2026, which the document itself describes as a marginal decrease from 5.8 percent in September 2025. Underemployment for the same group rose over that period, from 41.8 percent to 42 percent.
The proclamation argues that the Department of Labor's wage rulemaking will take significant time to correct the labor market, that fraud and abuse require a sustained response, and that without an extension the progress it describes would halt.
The Two Rulemakings the Proclamation Relies On
The Department of Homeland Security published a final rule on December 29, 2025, Weighted Selection Process for Registrants and Petitioners Seeking to File Cap-Subject H-1B Petitions, 90 Fed. Reg. 60864. It creates a selection process weighted toward higher-skilled and higher-paid beneficiaries, and the proclamation states it was in effect for the FY 2027 cap season.
The Department of Labor published a notice of proposed rulemaking on March 27, 2026, Improving Wage Protections for the Temporary and Permanent Employment of Certain Foreign Nationals in the United States, 91 Fed. Reg. 15454. The proclamation reports DOL analysis of labor condition application data finding that both the average wage actually paid to H-1B workers and the prevailing wage assigned to their positions remain well below the average wage of comparable American workers. That rule has not been finalized.
What Happens Next
The extension was jointly recommended by the Secretary of State, the Attorney General, the Secretary of Labor, and the Secretary of Homeland Security. The proclamation sets a further checkpoint: within 30 days of the completion of the H-1B lottery that immediately follows it, those same four officials are to submit a joint recommendation to the President on whether another extension or renewal is in the interest of the United States.
Where Things Stand
The entry restriction and its payment condition are extended through September 21, 2027 as a matter of the proclamation's text.
Collection of the $100,000 payment is subject to the court order described by USCIS, with the First Circuit having denied the government's stay request on July 24, 2026.
Cap-subject petitions continue to be selected under the DHS weighted selection process, applied for the FY 2027 cap season.
The Department of Labor's prevailing wage proposal remains at the proposed rule stage, so its wage level changes are not in effect.
The Wage and Hour Division's review of past labor condition applications begins within 30 days of the September 18 executive order.
The next formal decision point on the restriction itself is the interagency recommendation due within 30 days of the next H-1B lottery.