(DCNF)—CNN’s Scott Jennings broke down Republicans’ arguments on Friday after a feud broke out online over the use of H-1B visas.
Department of Government Efficiency co-heads Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy came under fire this week after a debate over H-1B visas erupted on X. On “The Lead with Jake Tapper,” Jennings was asked about the feud highlighting a division on policy within Trump’s base and whether it could harm the unity within the party so far.
“Look, there’s always been a push and pull on this in the Republican Party. I think there’s a way to work this out and solve it,” Jennings said. “I think what a lot of people would say is, Elon Musk was making this point, if you take the top 1% or the top 0.1% of the most talented engineering people from other countries, that’s perfectly fine. H-1B visas for that, they’re unique, they have unique talent, unique innovative skills, fine.”
“If you’re using the H-1B program to abuse it, to recruit interns, accountants, other people that easily could be recruited from the United States of America, all because you just want to do it cheaper, that’s not fine,” Jennings added.
Jennings went on to say how there could be a way to “retain” top visa performers, but he called out Ramaswamy for his take as it had “rightfully” angered supporters.
“So I think what a lot of people in the party want to do is eliminate the fraud in this H-1B program, retain the top engineering talent, and there’s a way to do this,” Jennings said. “What Ramaswamy did yesterday was not a great communications exercise, and it did anger a lot of people in the president’s coalition, and I think rightfully so.”
The debate over H-1B visas, one of the largest visa categories in the country, began with their use in the tech industry by users on X. According to the Department of Labor, the visas allow employers to hire skilled foreign workers and authorize “the temporary employment of qualified individuals who are not otherwise authorized to work in the U.S.”
While Musk simply commented “correct” in response to an X user’s claim that a slowdown in skilled immigration would ultimately hinder American innovation, Ramaswamy elaborated, saying how American culture uplifts “mediocrity over excellence.”
“Our American culture has venerated mediocrity over excellence for way too long (at least since the 90s and likely longer). 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,” Ramaswamy wrote.
Since Musk’s involvement in Trump’s campaign, Democrats have begun to ramp up their criticisms of Musk and his role in Trump’s second administration, with Democratic lawmakers like Rep. Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut referring to the billionaire as “President Musk” after he called out Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson’s original 1,574-page continuing resolution (CR).
(Featured Image Media Credit: Screenshot/CNN/”The Lead with Jake Tapper”)
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Far too many H1B visas are being issued. I witnessed it first hand while working in the oil industry. Here is how the scam worked. We would send employees (mainly engineers and HR managers) to the United Kingdom for training in their offshore operations and take UK employees in exchange, who came in on US work visas. When US oil companies dumped most of their North Sea assets when their production declined, the Americans in the UK came home, but the Brits in the US clung on. They formed protective cliques with their fellow HR comrades to discourage repatriation. I saw Brits in engineering and HR VP roles that could have easily been replaced by Americans, but they were not. It was blatant discrimination against US talent.
No. The disagreement is not JUST to eliminate fraud. It is to eliminate H1.B period. A tech job isn’t just a way to make money…technology develops and workers are educated in tandem with progress. H1.b puts brain trust in the heads of foreigners, leaving Americans behind. Not OK…ever!
My experience with H-1B’s over the last 30 years is that if the fraud was eliminated then 99% of the H-1B’s would have to be fired. The companies have been cheating the law since the early 90’s. There was a report from some technology think tank that there was a big shortage of engineers coming. I remember on the front page of early 1990’s EETimes there was coverage of a hearing by some congressman challenging that methodology of that report and clearly revealing that the report was a fraud. And then congress a year or two later pretending the fraud didn’t exist and phenomenally increasing the allowed number of H-1B’s. I wish I could find that report and remember the name of that congressman. I seem to recall it was Ryan or something like that. But online EETimes past issues don’t seem to go back that far. I wouldn’t be surprised that they were pushed into hiding those issues.
Ultimately the lower salaries of H-1B’s have pushed down the salaries of American engineers to an effective constant dollars of 1/2 to 1/3 of what they were in 1980. So many young Americans are not seeking STEM degrees since the wages are nothing special.(starting salary should be 150k instead of 60k) And thus the shortage has become a self fulfilling prophecy.
It is my conclusion that instead of helping the rest of the world to achieve a higher standard of living, instead the powers are bringing down the standard of living in America to a 3rd world level.
While there are a large number top class Indians when it comes to IT, because of the huge population of over 1.4 billion there are also huge numbers of poor performers and chancers who get into the top companies. These are a burden because other people in these companies have to continually help to fix up their mess. Ask your friends working in these companies about their experiences of people who have not been appointed on merit but to meet the diversity standards.
H1B visa program isn’t America First.