Maina wa Njuguna
LEDE:
- H-1B visa program fee is now $100,000.00
- California, Gov. Gavin Newsom signs a new law banning enforcement and ICE from wearing face masks
- An immigration judge in Georgia orders Spanish-language journalist Mario Guevara to be deported
- Liberian-American Rodney Taylor, a disabled Georgia barber still in detention nine months later since his arrest
US President Trump signed an executive order increasing the H-1B visa program fee to $100,000 for high-skilled workers to enter the country.
The H-1B is a non-immigrant visa in the US that lets U.S. employers to hire foreign workers in specialty occupations, as well as engineering, software development, fashion models.
The visa program is used by many large companies to hire thousands of software engineers and other highly-specialized workers. The new $100,000 fee will only apply to new visas, not renewals or current visa holders.
Immigration, and labor critics have decried that the system is ripe with abuse as companies circumvent hiring US nationals for low paid foreign skilled workers.
Meanwhile in Los Angeles, California, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a new law banning law enforcement and ICE from wearing masks while conducting arrests.
“We’re here in Los Angeles, the most diverse city in the most diverse state, California, and the world’s most diverse economy, it is a point of pride. We are majority-minority state, California…. 27% of Californians are foreign-born….. we practise pluralism, it’s a deep point of pride. Those values are under assault to a degree we could never have imagined.” – Gov. Gavin Newsom.
This legislative package signed into law yestarday includes the following –
- Families should be notified when immigration enforcement comes on school campuses, and establish that student information and classrooms are protected from ICE — and require a judicial warrant or court order to be accessed.
- Emergency rooms and other nonpublic areas in a hospital are off limits to immigration enforcement without a judicial warrant or court order, and it clarifies that immigration information collected by a health care provider is protected as medical information.
- Law and immigrant enforcement officers must be identifiable by name or badge number, and exceptions to that must be clearly established — masks are not to be worn except when absolutely necessary.
- Impersonating a federal agent is a crime.
In Georgia, an immigration judge ordered on Friday Spanish-language journalist Mario Guevara to be deported despite a pending First Amendment case in court.
Spanish-language journalist Mario Guevara /Courtesy/
He was arrested in DeKalb county while livestreaming a local “No Kings” protest against the Trump administration in the Atlanta metro area on June 14th, 2025 by the Doraville Police Department (DOP).
The Local law enforcement filed three misdemeanor charges against him: unlawful assembly, obstruction, and being a pedestrian on the roadway. The charges were later dropped.
Mr. Guevara arrived legally in the United States from El Salvador in April 2004, and applied for asylum in 2005 due to the dangers he faced as a journalist in his country. His request was initially denied, the case was administratively closed on appeal which paused deportation proceedings against Guevara indefinitely, but not permanently.
Rodney Taylor, a barber from Gwinnett county, GA /Courtesy/
Also in Georgia, Rodney Taylor, a disabled Georgia barber was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) nine months ago for an arrest 30 year ago for a criminal charge for burglary when he was a teenager. He has since then received a full pardon from Georgia State Board of Pardons and Paroles according to his lawyer.
Taylor has been in ICE custody at South Georgia’s Stewart detention center since January. The Atlanta-area barber and double amputee was brought to the U.S. when he was 2 years old for medical care by Shriners International.
/Courtesy/
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