Gov. Greg Abbott said Monday on a radio show that his office is examining whether taxpayer dollars are being used to pay for specialty visas for highly skilled workers at Texas K-12 schools and public universities.
Abbott’s comments came after the Quorum Report revealed that the governor asked Texas A&M University System campuses to submit a list of all employees on H-1B visas, including their countries of origin and roles, by the end of the day Monday.
Dallas ISD is on of the biggest sponsors of H-1B visas among public school districts in the U.S., The Dallas Morning News reported in 2023. In the 2022 fiscal year, the district sponsored 232 workers on such visas, according to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services data. It currently sponsors 230, according to 2025 data.
The district recently told The News it has about 380 employees total on H-1B visas.
The Education Lab
H-1B visas are part of a federal program that allow employers, including state agencies, to sponsor foreign workers in specialty occupations. Higher education institutions and hospital systems are among the groups that use the classification the most. Hundreds of foreign teachers are also employed under the program in Texas public schools, which are dealing with a teacher shortage.
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Abbott has sent inquiries to all public agencies and expects to announce an “action plan” later this week, he told conservative radio host Mark Davis on his Dallas-based show Monday morning. The Houston Chronicle did not receive an immediate response from the A&M System or the governor’s office Monday.
Abbott said that he doesn’t “see any reason” why H-1B visa holders would need to work in Texas public schools, although he acknowledged some may have special skill sets. He echoed some of the Trump administration earlier comments about H-1B visa fraud, alleging without evidence that some workers who were admitted during the Biden administration or earlier have overstayed their visas. Trump has recently qualified that he believes foreign labor is needed to employ “certain talents.”
Florida’s public universities are currently considering a one-year freeze on H-1B visa hiring, after Gov. Ron DeSantis instructed the Florida Board of Governors to crack down on “H-1B abuse.”
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According to federal data, UT Southwestern Medical Center is the second largest education sponsor of H1-B visas, after Dallas ISD, with 228. Other institutions that have large numbers of H-1B visa holders include: the Texas A&M flagship with 214; the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston with 171; and the University of Texas at Austin with 169.
Other Dallas-Fort Worth area districts and universities that were among the top H1-B visa sponsors in Texas include the University of Texas at Dallas with 73, the University of Texas at Arlington with 57, and the University of North Texas with 42. Southern Methodist University has 31.
As part of its immigration crackdown, the Trump administration has pursued major changes to the H-1B visa system, including a $100,000 payment for new petitioners as of September. Former fees, which are generally paid by the sponsor, ranged from $2,000 to $5,000. The current lottery system will also be replaced with a weighted system that prioritizes workers with higher pay and skills.
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Abbott said he wants to identify what jobs H-1B visa holders are filling that he believes cannot be filled by Texans. In some instances, the Republican governor suggested that he might call on the Trump administration to “withdraw them.”
“The fact of the matter is we want to make sure that our communities are safe,” Abbott said. “We want to make sure our communities are not having people come in and take jobs that Texans could easily fill.”
Dallas Morning News staff writer Silas Allen and Education Lab editor Carol Taylor contributed to this report.