US President Donald Trump defended the need for H-1B visas in an interview with Fox News on Tuesday, 11 November.  

Trump’s words sparked a spike in India’s IT companies on Wednesday. The Nifty IT index’s gains are led by Midcap stocks like Mphasis, LTIMindtree, and Persistent Systems, which are trading up 1.5% to 2.5%. Larger firms such as Infosys, TCS, and Tech Mahindra are trading up 1% each.

“You also do have to bring in talent,” Trump said. “You don’t have certain talents. And you have to, people have to learn. You can’t take people off, like an unemployment line, and say, ‘I’m going to put you into a factory. We’re going to make missiles,” the US President added.

In his second term, the Trump administration has tightened immigration enforcement, charging a $1,00,000 application fee on the H-1B visa, which is mostly utilised by the country’s major technology companies to bring in workers from abroad.  

Trump’s move prompted the US Chamber of Commerce to sue the government, but employers have also become less inclined to sponsor international students’ work permits.

Indian IT companies have also responded to the changes, claiming that they have drastically reduced their reliance on the H-1B visa. 

“You can’t just say a country is coming in, going to invest $10 billion to build a plant and going to take people off an unemployment line who haven’t worked in five years, and they’re going to start making missiles. It doesn’t work that way,” he added.

There was also controversy after a raid on Hyundai Motor Co. and LG Energy Solutions Ltd.’s electric battery plant in Georgia in September, which resulted in the detention of over 300 South Korean workers on charges of illegally entering the United States.

On Wednesday, the Nifty IT index rose for the third consecutive day. The index also rose 1% on Tuesday, boosted by increased optimism for an India-US trade deal and lower tariffs on Indian goods. However, the index is down roughly 17% year to date, with only LTIMindtree showing a gain.

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