Vivek Ramaswamy and Elon Musk expose MAGA's immigration hypocrisy | Opinion

It’s fun watching right-wingers turn on each other over high-skilled workers’ visas, exposing their hypocrisy on immigration.

The brawl involves Trump minion Vivek Ramaswamy and his take on the U.S. culture of “mediocracy” that leads to reliance on foreign high-tech workers.

MAGA’s most prominent warriors — including Elon Musk, Laura Loomer, and former U.N. ambassador and former Trump rival Nikki Haley — got into the fray at dizzying speed, firmly drawing the line between their two feuding camps.

“A culture that celebrates the prom queen over the math olympiad champ, or the jock over the valedictorian, will not produce the best engineers,” Ramaswamy wrote in a lengthy post on X, formerly Twitter, this week.

Vivek Ramaswamy picks a fight on H1-B visas

Elon Musk speaks with President-elect Donald Trump as they watch the launch of a SpaceX test flight on Nov. 19, 2024, in Brownsville, Texas.
Elon Musk speaks with President-elect Donald Trump as they watch the launch of a SpaceX test flight on Nov. 19, 2024, in Brownsville, Texas.

The billionaire Musk, who owns X, Tesla and SpaceX, chimed in, saying that “the number of people who are super talented engineers AND super motivated in the USA is far too low” to meet demand.

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“Think of this like a pro sports team: if you want your TEAM to win the championship, you need to recruit top talent wherever they may be,” he wrote.

“There is nothing wrong with American workers or American culture,” Haley snapped back, adding that “we should be investing and prioritizing in Americans, not foreign workers.”

These people are specifically fighting over H1-B visas, which the U.S. issues on a lottery basis to highly skilled foreigners and others who are in hot demand in Silicon Valley and across America.

If anyone knows about the enormous need for engineers and such, it would be Musk. He has built an enviable fortune with high-tech talent that undoubtedly includes foreigners.

Will Elon Musk or immigration hardliners win?

The split about H1-B visas unmasks the deep hypocrisy of MAGA’s “America First” mantra. And it exposes the harsh reality of the country’s insatiable capitalism, which needs cheap labor to produce products fast and at scale.

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This MAGA fight shows that putting America First into practice is a lot more complex than merely spewing a political slogan to incite the electorate against foreigners.

Who will Donald Trump listen to when he returns to the White House, though?

Will he listen to immigration hardliners who want to deport everyone here illegally and curtail workers’ visas to focus on Americans only?

Or will he listen to Musk’s camp instead, which seemingly understands that the American brand of capitalism can’t survive without foreign workers?

The outcome is easy to predict. Trump isn’t dumb, and in the end, he won’t do anything to hurt his billionaire pals who rely on foreign workers.

My guess: Trump will deport selectively

This MAGA brawl did crystalize Trump’s immigration strategy for me.

He almost certainly will carry out his mass deportation promise, but my guess is he’ll do so selectively, targeting the most vulnerable in Republican-dominated Texas to show his toughness and in heavily Democratic states to punish them.

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In the process, Trump will make his pals in the prison industry richer because, alas, deporting at scale requires new detention centers.

But I’m beginning to believe he’ll spare certain industries, like tech and farming and others that can’t survive without foreigners — legal or not.

Otherwise, America’s self-imposed decline will accelerate to the point of no return, to the delight of China and other countries that are investing in and training their people.

Perhaps the best thing some of us can do is sit back and watch MAGA chew itself out over the next four years.

Elvia Díaz is editorial page editor for The Arizona Republic and azcentral. Reach her at 602-444-8606 or elvia.diaz@arizonarepublic.com. Follow her on X, (formerly Twitter), @elviadiaz1

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: H1B visa fight makes Trump's immigration plan a lot clearer | Opinion