An online spat between Donald Trump’s supporters on immigration and the IT sector has exposed internal political divisions within his movement, giving a sneak peek at the rifts and divergent opinions his coalition may bring to the White House.
The split exposed the conflicts between Trump’s supporters of his hardline immigration policies in his Make America Great Again base and more affluent members of the tech industry, such as billionaire Elon Musk and fellow businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, who support their industry’s need for more highly skilled workers.
Right-wing activist Laura Loomer, who has a history of making racist and conspiratorial remarks, sparked the issue this week when she blasted Trump for appointing Sriram Krishnan as an adviser on artificial intelligence policy in his incoming government.
Krishnan is in favor of allowing more skilled foreigners to enter the country.
Loomer referred to the position as “not America First policy” and claimed that the tech executives who supported Trump were doing so for personal financial gain.
Musk controls the social media network X, where a large portion of the discussion took place.
Trump has appointed David Sacks, a venture capitalist and former PayPal executive, as the “White House A.I. & Crypto Czar,” and his remarks provoked a back-and-forth with Loomer.
Laptops 1000In their comments, Musk and Ramaswamy—whom Trump has charged with identifying ways to reduce the federal government—defended the necessity of hiring foreign labor for the tech sector.
It developed into a broader discussion in which more hard-right figures weighed in on issues such as the necessity of hiring Americans, whether American cultural values can produce the best engineers, online free speech, the newfound influence tech figures have in Trump’s world, and the principles of his political movement.
Trump hasn’t commented on the rift yet.
Questions concerning positions on highly skilled worker visas and the online debate among his followers were not answered by his presidential transition team.
Rather, his team emailed a link to a post on X by immigration hardliner and longtime adviser Stephen Miller, which was a copy of a 2020 speech Trump made at Mount Rushmore in which he honored historical personalities and events.
Musk, the richest man in the world and someone who has become very close to the president-elect was a major player in the debate because of his position on the employment of foreign workers by the tech industry as well as his prominence in the Trump campaign.
Software engineers and other IT workers need H-1B visas, which are essential for hard-to-fill jobs, according to tech employers.
However, detractors claim that they undercut American workers who are qualified for those positions.
Right-wingers have advocated for the program’s elimination rather than its expansion.
Musk, who was born in South Africa and was previously on an H-1B visa, defended the industry’s necessity of hiring foreign labor.
He stated in a post that “there is a permanent shortage of excellent engineering talent.” “It is Silicon Valley’s primary limiting factor.
The division inside Trump’s movement has been mirrored in his stances throughout the years.
His successful presidential campaign was largely attributed to his strict immigration policies, which included his promise of mass deportations.
In addition to focusing on illegal immigrants, he has called for restrictions on legal immigration, such as family-based visas.
Trump referred to the H-1B visa program as “very bad” and “unfair” for American workers when he was running for president in 2016.
To protect American workers, Trump issued a “Buy American and Hire American” executive order in 2017 that instructed Cabinet members to propose modifications that would guarantee H-1B visas were granted to the most highly qualified or well-paid candidates.
However, Trump’s companies have employed foreign workers, such as waiters and cooks at his Mar-a-Lago club, and his social media company, which created the Truth Social app, has employed highly qualified individuals under the H-1B program.
Trump said that illegal immigrants were “poisoning the blood of our country” during his 2024 presidential campaign when he made immigration his defining issue.
He also pledged to conduct the biggest deportation drive in American history.
However, in a podcast this year, Trump stated that he wants to automatically grant green cards to international students who graduate from American universities, which is a significant divergence from his typical alarmist rhetoric against immigration in general.
On the “All-In” podcast, which featured venture capitalists and IT industry professionals, he said, “I believe you should automatically get a green card as part of your diploma to be able to stay in this country.”
Trump made such remarks just as he was beginning to ally with leaders in the IT sector, but he did not include the proposal in his campaign platform or outline any plans to implement such changes.
