A bipartisan pair of U.S. senators has introduced legislation that would create a pilot visa program allowing states to sponsor temporary foreign workers to address local labor shortages. Senator John Curtis, a Utah Republican, and Senator Mark Kelly, an Arizona Democrat, unveiled the State-Sponsored Visa Pilot Program Act of 2026 on Monday.

The bill would establish a new temporary visa category that participating states could use to recruit workers for industries facing shortages. States would identify workforce demands and request visas tailored to their economic needs, while the federal government would continue to oversee screening, approval and enforcement. Participation would be voluntary.

"I've heard time and again from small business owners, farmers, and ranchers across Utah how difficult it has become to hire enough workers to meet growing market demands," Curtis said in a news release. "Our legislation would help fill the gap by creating a pilot program allowing states to sponsor visas tailored to their unique economies, without sacrificing rigorous federal vetting or accountability."

How the Pilot Program Would Work

The new visa category would allow states to sponsor foreign workers, investors and other migrants who they determine could contribute to their economic development. States would need approval from their legislatures before joining the program. They could petition the federal government on behalf of applicants, but visa holders would still need to pass federal background and security checks and meet existing admissibility requirements.

Visa holders would generally be required to live and work in the state that sponsored them, although states could form interstate compacts allowing participants to move among participating states. Workers could also change employers within a sponsoring state under rules established by that state.

The legislation would authorize visas for periods of up to three years, with renewals available if requested by the sponsoring state and if the holder remained in compliance with program requirements. States would periodically assess labor needs and wage data, establish mechanisms to investigate complaints of worker displacement, and certify that sponsored workers were not replacing U.S. workers.

Participants would be subject to federal, state and local labor and tax laws and would be ineligible for federal means-tested benefits. The bill includes compliance measures for states: if federal overseers determine that more than 3 percent of a state's visa holders violate program terms, the state must impose a minimum $4,000 bond on future participants and would face a 50 percent reduction in its visa allocation the following year.

Annual visa allocations would be set through a formula based on population, economic growth and program performance. States with low violation rates could receive additional visas; states with higher noncompliance rates could see allocations reduced or suspended.

The measure would also let participating states sponsor certain immigrants already living in the United States who can demonstrate they were present in the country on December 31, 2016, provided they pass background checks, pay a $1,000 penalty and meet eligibility requirements. Applicants could receive waivers for certain immigration violations that might otherwise disqualify them.

"States understand their own economic needs best, but federal rules currently determine who can live and work here," Kelly said. "Our bipartisan bill would let Arizona and other states choose the visas they need to fill labor gaps and strengthen their local economies."

Support, Opposition and Long Odds

Business and immigration advocacy groups backing the bill include UnidosUS, the National Immigration Forum, the American Business Immigration Coalition Action and the U.S. Hispanic Business Council. Supporters say the program could help agriculture, construction, hospitality and manufacturing.

Some conservatives have pushed back. The Utah Federation of College Republicans wrote on social media that the proposed program represented a "complete displacement and disregard for Gen-Z Utahns."

A similar state-sponsored visa bill was introduced in 2017 by Republican Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin. Curtis took it up in 2019 while serving in the House, but neither version advanced. Congress has not enacted major immigration legislation since 1986.

"A state-sponsored visa is a fantastic idea," wrote David Bier, an immigration policy expert at the Cato Institute. "If the State-Sponsored Visa Pilot Program Act had existed, there would have been very little illegal immigration since 1986, the last major guest worker reform."

The proposal needs approval from both the Republican-controlled House and Senate before reaching President Donald Trump's desk. Unlike a 2011 Utah guest-worker law that never took effect for lack of federal authorization, this bill would amend federal immigration law directly. Utah's labor market remains what the U.S. Chamber of Commerce describes as "severe," with 96 available workers for every 100 open jobs as of December.