The second Trump Administration began with a flurry of Executive Orders, some of which create policies which will significantly impact the relocation of Israelis to the United States. The new policies compel Israeli companies to reassess their corporate relocation strategies, both with regard to pending relocations pending relocations and to employees already on relocation in the United States.
“America First,” Relocation Visas Last
A January 20, 2025 Executive Order titled “America First Policy Directive to the Secretary of State” provides: “As soon as practicable, the Secretary of State shall issue guidance bringing the Department of State’s policies, programs, personnel, and operations in line with an America First foreign policy, which puts America and its interests first.”
This policy order will mean the reinstatement of visa regulations from the first Trump administration (later cancelled by the Biden administration), advising American Consular Officers adjudicating visa applications to consider whether approval of a given work visa is good for America, or could potentially harm the economic interests of workers in the United States.
Under these visa regulations, Israelis were often challenged to obtain two consular based work visa classifications: the E-1 international trade work visa; and the E-2 investment visa. Visa regulations have always granted American Consular Officers with a great amount of judgment and discretion in deciding whether the standards of these two work visas have been met in any given application. (One example: Is the Israeli company sufficiently “real and operating” to justify visa issuance?) The added overlay of “do the Israeli company’s U.S. activities promote America and its interests, or might they negatively impact American companies, including competitors and their American workforce” was often a deciding factor in approving or denying E-1 and E-2 work visa applications during the first Trump administration. We can expect to see a full return of this two-layered, highly-discretionary E-1 and E-2 visa process.
The L-1 work visa also presented major challenges to Israelis and others after the 2016 election. Approval rates for this visa – meant to facilitate the relocation of executives, managers and experts from an Israeli company to a related U.S. company – dropped significantly during the first Trump administration. Per data released by United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), at one point nearly 60% of L-1 visa petitions were subjected to Requests for Evidence. According to State Department data, the rate of L-1 visa denial following a consular interview rose to 21% (compared with a 03% denial rate under the Biden administration).
An additional Executive Order could limit use by Israelis of the O-1 (“extraordinary ability”) work visa. Titled “Removing Barriers to American Leadership in Artificial Intelligence,” this Executive Order seeks to solidify America’s position as the global leader in AI. The Executive Order revokes “certain existing AI policies and directives that act as barriers to American AI innovation, clearing a path for the United States to act decisively to retain global leadership in artificial intelligence.” Among these revoked AI policies and directives: Biden administration efforts to facilitate the use of the O-1 visa by foreign AI experts.
The Executive Order titled “America First Policy Directive to the Secretary of State” can be accessed here.
The Executive Order titled “Removing Barriers to American Leadership in Artificial Intelligence” can be accessed here.
Increased L-1 Visa Compliance Review Site Visits of Executives, Managers and Experts
Unannounced visits by USCIS inspectors of L-1 visa holders’ places of work slacked off during the Biden years. No more. An Executive Order titled “Protecting the American People Against Invasion” provides: “Enforcing our Nation’s immigration laws is critically important to the national security and public safety of the United States. The American people deserve a Federal Government that puts their interests first and a Government that understands its sacred obligation to prioritize the safety, security, and financial and economic well-being of Americans.” This January 2025 Executive Order mirrors a January 2017 Trump Executive Order that provided additional resources to “carry out the critical work of securing our borders, enforcing our immigration laws.” Increasing L-1 compliance review site visits was one way that USCIS implemented that Executive Order.
We can now expect a surge in USCIS L-1 compliance review site visits. USCIS inspectors come armed with long lists of questions aimed at verifying that both the company and its L-1 employees are complying with the information provided in an L-1 petition.
Inspectors’ questions range from reviewing the company’s business activities (income and employee information, for example), to interviewing the L-1 employees about the nature of their work and underlying executive, managerial or expert qualifications. Per USCIS:
“Officers record their observations on a Compliance Review Report. Officers occasionally conduct multiple site visits if they need more information to complete a compliance review. At the site visit, the officer will:
- Verify the information, including supporting documents, submitted with the petition;
- Verify that the petitioning organization exists;
- Review public records and information on the petitioning organization;
- Take photographs;
- Review documents;
- Interview company personnel to confirm the beneficiary’s work location, physical workspace, hours, salary and duties; and
- Speak with the L-1 employee.”
If unsatisfied with the responses, the inspectors initiate a process leading to termination of the petition and removal of the L-1 employee from the United States.
As a result, Israeli companies in the United States must ensure their L-1 employees are working from the specific business address listed on the L-1 petition, and not from home. (You really do not want USCIS inspectors showing up at your house.)
Additionally, companies must timely file amended L-1 petitions each time one of its employees is relocated domestically within the United States, for example from company offices in San Francisco to offices in Austin. We recommend that each company a written action plan so that key staffers, from Office Managers to CEOs can quickly respond to USCIS compliance review site visits – including what to do if the employee is away from the office at the time of a visit.
Information about USCIS compliance review site visits can be found here.
The Executive Order titled “Protecting the American People Against Invasion” can be found here.
A list of typical questions, taken from an actual L-1 compliance review site visit, can be found here.
Enhanced Vetting of Work Visa Applications
An Executive Order issued on the first day of the new Trump administration relates to the enhanced vetting of foreign nationals seeking work and other visas to the United States. Per a section of the Executive Order subtitled “Enhanced Vetting and Screening”:
“The United States must be vigilant during the visa-issuance process to ensure that those aliens approved for admission into the United States do not intend to harm Americans or our national interests. More importantly, the United States must identify them before their admission or entry into the United States”. Visa applications must be evaluated to ensure that they are not used “to harm the security, economic, political, cultural, or other national interests of the United States.” In so doing, American Consular Officers are directed to “vet and screen to the maximum degree possible” all applicants “seeking a visa of any kind.”
Enhanced vetting and screening means an increased use of “Administrative Processing” (also referred to as “Additional Processing”). Under this mechanism, American Consular Officers refer visa applications for additional security or other background checks, either locally by the Embassy in Israel, or by a Washington-based law enforcement or intelligence agency. The referral of a visa application to Administrative Processing results in a visa denial, which will be overcome if the results of the additional check are non-derogatory. The reasons for the referral are never provided to the visa applicant.
Consular Officers traditionally use Administrative Processing for additional checks on visa applicants who have criminal or DUI convictions, or past immigration violations such as working without authorization or overstaying their time of admission to the United States. Regrettably, the first Trump Administration was marked by the enhanced vetting and screening of Israeli citizens involved with scientific or technical fields – in other words, Israelis in high-tech and the sciences.
Per a U.S. Embassy in Israel webpage from that period: “Visa applications for individuals who work or study in scientific and technical fields may be subject to additional processing.” As part of this additional processing, Israelis in those fields applying for U.S. work visas were often required to provide CVs with detailed descriptions of present and previous work, including dates; educational background, including institution, dates, fields of study, degree, research topic and funding sources; and research expertise, military service, computer training or other specialized training.
Many such visa applicants were also required to complete a supplemental visa form, called DS-5535. The form’s supplemental questions include items such as: “Have you travelled to any country in the last 15 years? If yes, provide details for each trip, including locations visited, date visited, source of funds, and length of stay. Provide all addresses where you have lived during the last 15 years. Please provide your unique user name for any websites or applications you have used to create or share content (photos, videos, status updates, etc.) as part of a public profile within the last five years. Provide the following information on all employment in the last fifteen years.”
The increased use of Administrative Processing and Form DS-5535 by American Consular Officers seeking to “vet and screen visa applicants to the maximum degree possible” could have a significant impact on the work visa application process by Israelis working or studying or serving in scientific and technical fields.
Another Executive Order adds an unexpected source of frustration. Wait times for scheduling an Embassy work visa interview appointment will increase; and the Administrative Processing step could take longer than usual. The reason: An Executive Order in which the President ordered a freeze on the hiring of Federal civilian employees, to be applied throughout the executive branch. In January 2017 the Trump administration implemented a similar Executive Order that kept a hiring freeze at the State Department in place for a year and-a-half. The result then was unprecedented Embassy visa wait times, since there were far fewer American Consular Officers to adjudicate visa applications. The January 2025 Executive Order will almost certainly result in a similar snail-paced visa application process.
The Executive Order calling for enhanced vetting of visa applicants can be found here.
The Executive Order directing a federal hiring freeze can be found here.
Form DS-5535 can be seen here.
What Else Could Go Wrong? A Few Additional Possibilities
1) Employment Authorization for Accompanying Spouse
The Biden administration encouraged the relocation of foreign businesses likely to contribute the American economy by making the relocation process more family-friendly. Specifically, the accompanying spouse of a foreign executive, manager or expert in L-1, E-1 or E-2 visa status was provided automatic employment authorization during their stay in the United States. This authorization allows the spouse to work in the United States without limitation from Day 1 of the relocation, and even to open a business of their own. Given the Executive Orders discussed above, we can expect the new Trump administration to cancel the Biden automatic work authorization policy and require spouses who wish to work in the United States to submit individual applications with USCIS. Current processing times for this type of individual application are about 5 1/2 months.
2) American Citizenship for Children Born During Relocation
A January 2025 Executive Order titled “Protecting the Meaning and Value of American Citizenship” seeks to overturn the right of almost everyone born in the United States to American citizenship. Per the Executive Order: “The privilege of United States citizenship does not automatically extend to persons born in the United States…when that person’s mother’s presence in the United States at the time of said person’s birth was lawful but temporary (such as, but not limited to, visiting the United States under the auspices of the Visa Waiver Program or visiting on a student, work, or tourist visa) and the father was not a United States citizen or lawful permanent resident at the time of said person’s birth.”
The provisions of the Executive Order are widely believed to violate the guarantees to citizenship provided by the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, and the Executive Order is now being contested in federal court. If the courts uphold the Executive Order, the children born in the United States to the overwhelming number of Israelis on relocation will no longer acquire American Citizenship.
The “Protecting the Meaning and Value of American Citizenship” Executive Order can be found here.
3) H-1B Work Visas
This work visa, reserved for foreign experts in professional fields from engineering to business, and from education to computer science, could flourish under the second Trump administration. The H-1B visa is currently subject to an annual worldwide quota largely negating its use for the relocation of Israeli professional to the United States. With some irony, the H-1B work visa could become an element of the Golden Age for the U.S. promised by President Trump, not because of an Executive Order, but because Elon Musk is a huge supporter of the use of this visa classification. According to media reports, President Trump has agreed to back Musk’s calls for removing barriers to the use of H-1B visas, particularly for tech industries. If and when this occurs, Israeli executives, managers and experts will have a path for relocation to the United States which could make up for some of the impact on other work visas impacted by the January 2025 Executive Orders.
One representative media report (“Trump sides with Elon Musk in H-1B visa debate”) can be found here.
The content is provided for informational purposes only and is not intended to be comprehensive. It does not serve to replace professional legal advice required on a case by case basis
