India, Dec. 25 -- In a big blow to H1-B applicants, a federal judge sided with the Trump administration, upholding the $100,000 fee on new applications. In a ruling on Tuesday, District Judge Beryl Howell said that President Donald Trump's effort to increase the cost of the popular visa is lawful. The US Chamber of Commerce, which sued to block the proposal, can appeal the decision.

This comes after the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced that it is changing the H-1B work visa selection rules, replacing the lottery system with wage and skill-based selection.

"The new rule replaces the random lottery for selecting visa recipients with a process that gives greater weight to those with higher skills," the DHS said in the statem...