I need an H-1B visa. How do employers view this?

[International Student]

Some places I am applying to ask very pointed questions about whether the applicant has employment authorization or will be requiring visa sponsorship.

I need visa sponsorship. Does this mean that my chances at such institutions are diminished? 

Would greatly appreciate answers from faculty who have served on hiring committees that have experience with this issue. Would appreciate if folks refrained from feedback that was entirely speculative.

Thanks for your time.

[someinfo]

I've been on a couple of search committees at my University, and to the best of my knowledge, that question and others like it came from and were handled by the Human Resources Office. The search committee didn't see that part of candidates' applications. I would be surprised if it wasn't the same at other places.

[someinfo]

I forgot to add that one of the search committees I was on did hire a candidate who needed something related to their Visa. I don't know the details because we (the search committee) had no knowledge of or involvement in that aspect of the hiring process.

[International Student]

Dear someinfo,

Thanks so much for sharing that. It's really helpful to know search committees' perspective and degree of involvement in the process.

Best.

[ReceivedInstruction]

I am on search committee right now and we were specifically told that the position we were hiring for was not visa eligible because it was a one year renewable term--not tenure track. I think the answer is, at smaller schools (such as mine) and for non-tenure track positions it matters more than for a bigger school or for a tenure track position. Historically, at our university we have hired people that needed visas, so not sure if this is a new trend across the board related to the current political climate or if we always treated non-tenure track positions differently in terms of visa sponsorship.