Musk and Ramaswamy defend foreign worker visas, sparking MAGA backlash
CNN
Social media posts by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy arguing in favor of expanding the visa program for highly skilled workers have set off a debate among supporters of President-elect Donald Trump over how the program should fit into the incoming administration’s aggressive immigration agenda.
Social media posts by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy arguing in favor of expanding the visa program for highly skilled workers have set off a debate among supporters of President-elect Donald Trump over how the program should fit into the incoming administration’s aggressive immigration agenda. Musk and Ramaswamy, whom Trump has tapped to lead his Department of Government Efficiency, defended companies who use workers on H-1B visas, arguing tech companies — including those owned by Musk — depend on foreign workers to operate. But their message rankled some of Trump’s most loyal defenders who expect his administration to crack down on immigration and promote American labor. Trump restricted access to foreign worker visas during his first term and has targeted the H-1B program in past remarks. But during the 2024 campaign, Trump signaled openness to giving some foreign-born workers legal status if they graduated from a US university. In a social media post on Wednesday, Musk said US tech companies need “double” the amount of engineers working in America today and compared the benefits of the program to a professional sports team recruiting the best talent from around the world. “If you want your TEAM to win the championship, you need to recruit top talent wherever they may be. That enables the whole TEAM to win,” Musk wrote on X. “I am referring to bringing in via legal immigration the top ~0.1% of engineering talent as being essential for America to keep winning,” Musk wrote in another post on Thursday. “Thinking of America as a pro sports team that has been winning for a long time and wants to keep winning is the right mental construct.”
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