Posted: 12/20/2005

WASHINGTON - The Congress has dropped a Senate-passed measure to raise the cap on H1-B visas by 30,000 workers. The provision was dropped from a budget bill that passed the House early Monday Dec. 19, 2005, disappointing high-tech and manufacturing firms in search of skilled workers.

The six-year H1-B visas are reserved for highly skilled foreign workers. In 2004, the Congress limited the number of H1-B visas to 65,000 a year, and that limit has already been reached for the government's 2006 fiscal year, which began in October.

Critics contend the visas give foreigners high-level jobs that should go to American workers, and the plan was opposed by some House Republicans as a backdoor way to boost immigration. House and Senate negotiators left it out of the final version of a $39.7 billion federal budget bill that passed the House 212-206 and was expected to get a Senate vote later in the same day.

House and Senate negotiators also dropped a plan to increase fees on another kind of visa, the L-1, which companies use to transfer workers they already employ in foreign countries to the United States.