bengaluru, June 8 -- The US's H-1B visa programme is facing its strongest political pushback yet since it was launched well over three decades ago. Since January, at least a dozen Republican lawmakers have backed four bills that seek to restrict, suspend or eventually eliminate the programme. This signals uncertainty for visa holders residing in the US with their families, many of them being Indians, most of whom work at information technology (IT) firms. On June 4, Chip Roy, a Republican lawmaker from Texas, presented a bill that brought seven reforms on use of H-1B visas. As per the current norms, any employee in the US on an H-1B visa can stay up to six years and use that time to apply for permanent residency. This bill proposes to cut the stay to two years and mandates the employee to prove they plan to go back home. The bill also sought to stymie the use of H-1B visas by IT outsourcers. Indian IT services firms got about 11,000 H-1B visas as of 31 March 2026, and each of them earn at least half of their revenue from the US. India's IT firms are among the 30 largest users of these visas. "The percentage of the employer's employees within the United States who are nonimmigrants does not exceed 5 percent," read the proposed American White-Collar Worker Jobs Act of 2026. It also seeks to increase the salaries these companies pay to H-1B visa holders to more than what is earned by three-fourths of the population in the area of residence of these H-1B visa holders-a move aimed at dissuading firms from hiring cheaper labour from overseas. "United States workers have the right not to be displaced by nonimmigrant workers," it stated. "Any United States worker who is displaced by a non-immigrant shall have a cause of action in tort in the Federal courts against those employers causing the displacement, whether directly or indirectly." For now, each of India's 10 top IT outsourcers have said they have increased local hiring in the US and are reducing their dependence on such visas. The latest bill comes two months after at least three Republican lawmakers sought to remove and pause the H-1B visa process. On 2 January, former Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene introduced the 'End H-1B Now Act' to "completely eliminate" programme, with an exemption of granting up to 10,000 H-1B visas a year for medical professionals such as physicians, surgeons and nurses....