US to add 65,000 seasonal guest worker visas for 2026

[martybegan]

But the ones we DO have won’t lift a finger. When I was a young teen, I used to listen to the TV on a snowy morning hoping for a snow day: no school AND a chance to earn shoveling money!

Parents really spoil their kids.

I worked for my father off the books when he did his handyman side business. Learned how to housepaint and hate wallpaper.

 

[Lisa558]

I worked for my father off the books when he did his handyman side business. Learned how to housepaint and hate wallpaper.

Hate wallpaper? Or hang?

 

[martybegan]

Hate wallpaper? Or hang?

Hate wallpaper. removing it, hanging it, everything about it.

Especially "locking pattern" wallpaper that requires you to line up two halves of something like birds of cuckoo clocks.

 

[Lisa558]

I worked for my father off the books when he did his handyman side business. Learned how to housepaint and hate wallpaper.

I remember when I was about six and my father was painting our downstairs bathroom. He told me if I helped him paint one of the walls (an easy one) he would give me a dollar.

Dad wanted to teach the value of work-for-pay early.

(Of course, he had to redo the mess I made on the wall. But that’s besides the point…)

 

[Care4all]

When I was a teen, groups of us would head to resort towns and take jobs as maids, waitresses, etc., etc., and bunk down 4 to a room in cheap motels. We earned money, had time off to enjoy the resort town, and learned the value of work for pay.

Nowadays, the neighborhood teens won’t even shovel the driveways.

P.S. That sounds like it was a lot of fun!


When I was a kid in high school, my parents only bought me the basics in clothes and supplies for back to school ........and basically anything else, like money for the movies, new outfits for school or work, vacations on Spring break with schoolmates, my first used car when I got to driving age, its insurance etc, had to be paid out of my own pocket...I worked part time throughout the school year beginning at 15, and 40 hours a week every summer...and I LOVED it, because I had my own money, to make my own choices with and learned about working and saving up, to be able to buy something I really wanted or really needed for my own freedom....like a car. Credit cards were unheard of back then or considered unwise by my parents....they didn't even have one, when I was young!

 

[Fang]

Is this America first or America last? I haven't heard a single member of Congress call this out. This seems to stand against everything Trump laid out, so why is he doing it?

https://www.reuters.com/world/trump-administration-will-add-roughly-65000-seasonal-guest-worker-visas-2026-2026-01-30/

What's the issue? I never heard Trump or any Republican say they had a problem with legal immigration or guest workers on visas. It's the Democrat's open border policy inviting thousands of criminals to the US and making the journey extremely dangerous for women and children. It just seems so... common sense to have a much safer policy for everyone involved in immigration.

 

[sartre play]

That's how it worked back in the day and how it's supposed to work. Nothing new here at all.

Most of our apple pickers came from Jamacia. They moved from migrant camp to migrant camp then went home after the season was done. A few stayed behind for winter pruning but even those had to return to Jamacia for X number of days before they could come back.

It was a well-oiled machine and worked fine.....Don't know what happened to mess it up unless it was the congress-critters who lobbied the state department to keep bring in more to take over the poultry and meatpacking industries.

In that regard the GOP was worse than the dems, at least in my district.

it was not a well oiled machine, to young to remember the 70s?

 

[sartre play]

I’m all for enabling foreign workers to come to the US and provide their skills, meet labor market demand, and earn money for themselves and families - PROVIDED that both they and the employer abide by US IMMIGRATION LAWS.

No one is above the law.

Now the people with the big money need the labor, so its ok to let 6500 Mexicans come here?
Now its different?
YES immigration needs fixing.
What ever works best for the richest.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

Is this America first or America last? I haven't heard a single member of Congress call this out. This seems to stand against everything Trump laid out, so why is he doing it?

https://www.reuters.com/world/trump-administration-will-add-roughly-65000-seasonal-guest-worker-visas-2026-2026-01-30/

Because someone much smarter than him reminded him that we need these seasonal workers.

 

[Lisa558]

P.S. That sounds like it was a lot of fun!


When I was a kid in high school, my parents only bought me the basics in clothes and supplies for back to school ........and basically anything else, like money for the movies, new outfits for school or work, vacations on Spring break with schoolmates, my first used car when I got to driving age, its insurance etc, had to be paid out of my own pocket...I worked part time throughout the school year beginning at 15, and 40 hours a week every summer...and I LOVED it, because I had my own money, to make my own choices with and learned about working and saving up, to be able to buy something I really wanted or really needed for my own freedom....like a car. Credit cards were unheard of back then or considered unwise by my parents....they didn't even have one, when I was young!

Oh, it was tremendous fun!

“Our” resort town was a beach town, and the motel cost about $20 a night -based on a monthly rate - when the minimum wage was $2/hr. That means we each pitched in $5 a day for the motel and earned $16 a day - leaving us $9 a day for fun. And this was back when a slice a pizza was $1 and a “eat-in” dinner was around $6.

Things were so much better back then.

 

[Correll]

Alinsky tactic…

Yep. These people are ... insanely dishonest.

It would be sooooo nice to have a loyal opposition, instead of filthy traitors.

 

[LeftofLeft]

Now the people with the big money need the labor, so its ok to let 6500 Mexicans come here?
Now its different?
YES immigration needs fixing.
What ever works best for the richest.

My wife is Mexican and my sons are Mexican. It’s always good to let Mexicans or anyone else come here PROVIDED they observe and respect US Immigration Laws.

There is never a valid excuse to violate the Immigration laws of this nation or any other nation. Why that such a hard concept?

 

[j-mac]

Yep. These people are ... insanely dishonest.

It would be sooooo nice to have a loyal opposition, instead of filthy traitors.

Man, ain't that the truth....Ya know, back in the day of message boards, we didn't have so many flat out stupid people on the boards...In the early days, much more intellectual. Sure, you could tell the liberals from the conservatives, however there was actual conversation, and ideas being talked about...Now some 30 years later, it's devolved to something that makes the monkey cage at the zoo seem more normal...

 

[Lisa558]

Man, ain't that the truth....Ya know, back in the day of message boards, we didn't have so many flat out stupid people on the boards...In the early days, much more intellectual. Sure, you could tell the liberals from the conservatives, however there was actual conversation, and ideas being talked about...Now some 30 years later, it's devolved to something that makes the monkey cage at the zoo seem more normal...

It’s reflective of what’s happening IRL. Cant have a normal conversation with a Democrat there either.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

We all understand who and what Trump is.

Clearly someone convinced him that banning seasonal workers would personally harm him , via hurting his economic numbers.

 

[Correll]

Man, ain't that the truth....Ya know, back in the day of message boards, we didn't have so many flat out stupid people on the boards...In the early days, much more intellectual. Sure, you could tell the liberals from the conservatives, however there was actual conversation, and ideas being talked about...Now some 30 years later, it's devolved to something that makes the monkey cage at the zoo seem more normal...

Agreed.

I don't know what percentage of them have been formally trained in the Alinski rules, but overall, they have all ended up there, one way or another.

We almost never have real discussion, we end up with an attempt at it, and it gets shut down by, lefties throw verbal shit, like monkeys.

 

[struth]

Is this America first or America last? I haven't heard a single member of Congress call this out. This seems to stand against everything Trump laid out, so why is he doing it?

https://www.reuters.com/world/trump-administration-will-add-roughly-65000-seasonal-guest-worker-visas-2026-2026-01-30/

How does it stand against what Trump laid out? He has always supported legal immigrant

 

[sparky]

Yeah, I oppose that. But you know, the left is going to continue to exploit the brown man and the GOP is happy to remain silent about it.

said GOP placed a $$$ on it Dark one, essentially addressing the prostitution of 'brown man' labor .....~S~

 

[sartre play]

My wife is Mexican and my sons are Mexican. It’s always good to let Mexicans or anyone else come here PROVIDED they observe and respect US Immigration Laws.

There is never a valid excuse to violate the Immigration laws of this nation or any other nation. Why that such a hard concept?

Agree, just being MEXICAN is not a good excuse for the level of blame & hate.
Lots of really bad guys from all country's doing major harm here. So why import thousands in just to fill the big guys needs?
Do we not have enough hard working here to give the green cards to?

 

[leftwinger]

Legal guest workers usually cost more because their minimum wage is usually above the actual state minimum wage. I am fine with more legal guest workers, but if ICE continues to run around sweeping up all the brown folks, they still may have trouble getting them. I have seen some farms on our regional ag show saying they have lost legal guest workers that have worked for them every year for sometimes decades because they were too afraid to come into the US now.

The $100,000 fee applies specifically to certain H-1B visa petitions, not all guest worker visas. It was introduced in September 2025 under a presidential proclamation and primarily targets new H-1B hires from outside the United States.