The White House’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs has cleared a Department of Homeland Security proposal that would scrap the random lottery used to award the 85,000 H-1B visas available each year. The draft rule would instead rank petitions by factors such as offered wages or education level, giving higher-paid or more highly skilled candidates priority. Clearance by OIRA is typically the last step before a proposal is published in the Federal Register, opening a 30- to 60-day public-comment window. Separately, the U.S. State Department will require all H-1B holders who renew visas abroad to appear for in-person consular interviews starting Sept. 2. The change ends the widely used drop-box process and limits renewals to an applicant’s home country, a shift immigration attorneys say could lengthen wait times at busy posts such as those in India and push more applicants into already back-logged U.S. field offices. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services has meanwhile expanded the circumstances under which it issues Notices to Appear, exposing a broader group of H-1B and family-based benefit seekers to possible removal proceedings after petition denials. Practitioners report a rise in enforcement actions against workers who lose employment but are still within the program’s 60-day grace period. The visa actions are part of a wider overhaul of business immigration programs. On the same day the H-1B proposal advanced, the White House also began reviewing an updated fee schedule for EB-5 investor visas, whose minimum investment thresholds were raised in 2022.