MAGA movement fractures on key immigration debate

Conflict ensued inside MAGA world on Thursday as President-elect Donald Trump’s allies sparred over immigration policy.

Former Republican presidential candidate and incoming head of the DOGE Vivek Ramaswamy sparked the conversation in a lengthy X post on Thursday. Ramaswamy, who himself is a first-generation American, criticized American culture as promoting mediocrity, which is why he says tech companies often prefer foreign-born workers over native Americans.

“Our American culture has venerated mediocrity over excellence for way too long (at least since the 90s and likely longer),” Ramaswamy said. “That doesn’t start in college, it starts YOUNG. A culture that celebrates the prom queen over the math olympiad champ, or the jock over the valedictorian, will not produce the best engineers.”

“More movies like Whiplash, fewer reruns of ‘Friends,'” Ramaswamy continued. “More math tutoring, fewer sleepovers. More weekend science competitions, fewer Saturday morning cartoons. More books, less TV. More creating, less ‘chillin.’ More extracurriculars, less ‘hanging out at the mall.'”

Ramaswamy’s commentary set off a chain reaction of conflict in MAGA world and even outside Trump’s inner circle.

‘These are temporary foreign workers, imported from abroad, for the explicit purpose of substituting for American workers at lower pay,’ Trump said.

Former Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley, of all people, came out against Ramaswamy and said the hiring disparities had nothing to do with culture but rather everything to do with immigration policy.

“There is nothing wrong with American workers or American culture,” Haley said. “All you have to do is look at the border and see how many want what we have. We should be investing and prioritizing in Americans, not foreign workers.”

The online discourse resurfaced an older conversation surrounding immigration policy and the differences between H-1B visas as opposed to O-1 visas.

H-1B visas allow foreign nationals to work in America for a temporary period of time and for a specialty occupation. Most notably, H-1B visas have become instrumental in Silicon Valley’s growth, with nearly three-quarters of the workforce being foreign-born.

On the other hand, an O-1 visa is a more stringent nonimmigrant visa for foreign nationals who possess an “extraordinary ability” or who have demonstrated a “record of extraordinary achievement” in a specialized field.

Although Musk himself held an H-1B visa, he advocated an immigration philosophy that closely resembled standards put forward for O-1 visas.

“I am referring to bringing in via legal immigration the top ~0.1% of engineering talent as being essential for Americans to keep winning,” Musk said. “This is like bringing in the Jokic’s or Wemby’s of the world to help your whole team (which is mostly Americans!) win the NBA. 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.”

Trump notably came out against visa programs like H-1B in 2016, arguing that the program is an opportunity to displace American workers with “imported” and “cheap labor” workers.

“The H-1B program is neither high-skilled nor immigration: these are temporary foreign workers, imported from abroad, for the explicit purpose of substituting for American workers at lower pay,” Trump said. “I remain totally committed to eliminating rampant, widespread H-1B abuse and ending outrageous practices such as those that occurred at Disney in Florida when Americans were forced to train their foreign replacements. I will end forever the use of the H-1B as a cheap labor program, and institute an absolute requirement to hire American workers first for every visa and immigration program. No exceptions.”

Although Trump has not specifically addressed H-1B in recent years, strict immigration policy was the cornerstone of his 2024 campaign. While Trump repeatedly advocated shutting down the border and putting America first, we will have to see how the internal fractures within the MAGA movement play out in the incoming administration.

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