Originally posted as a thread on X.

In March 2016, Donald Trump said that “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,” and affirmed his commitment to “eliminating rampant, widespread H-1B abuse.” 

Eight years later, the President-Elect has filled key positions with staff and advisors who flagrantly promote ending caps on H-1B visas, thereby undercutting American tech workers with cheaper foreign labor. 

The MAGA movement used to be based on a core belief in American Exceptionalism. This was the platform that catapulted Trump to the presidency in 2016. But in 2024, swayed by the same technocratic sycophants who rode Trump’s coattails into the White House, the incoming administration is at risk of jettisoning this basic premise of America First populism. 

The likes of @elonmusk, @sriramk, @DavidSacks, and others have claimed that American tech industries will suffer if we do not increase the importation of foreign labor through H-1B visas. Implicit in this argument is that American tech workers are somehow inferior in training and intellect to their foreign counterparts. Even @VivekGRamaswamy said as much, albeit more diplomatically, when weighing in on the controversy. Perhaps most egregiously, @Jason, co-host of the All-In podcast with David Sacks, who directly encouraged Trump to increase importation of foreign tech labor earlier this year, has recently called for filling so-called skilled labor shortages by importing a staggering “5m immigrants to America every year for the next 20.”

These arguments are fundamentally anti-American, and are built on two myths.

1) The myth of a domestic talent shortage. How can we claim that America has a shortage in tech labor when there have been nearly 150,000 tech layoffs just in 2024. Moreover, DEI and affirmative action policies have served to undermine merit-based hiring in the domestic talent pool for several decades running.

2) The myth of foreign, particularly Indian, tech superiority. We are focusing on India because over 70 percent of H-1B visas over the past decade were given to Indian nationals, and because Sriram Krishnam has specifically called for a removal of country caps for green cards – a policy which would disproportionately favor foreign labor from India.

Yet, India – from which we import an outsized percentage of our tech labor, has consistently failed to rank even in the top 10 on the WIPO Global Innovation Index. (Switzerland, Sweden, the US, and the UK have held the top 4 spots in these rankings for the last 5 years.)

The problem is not that America has a shortage of talent, but that foreign labor, particularly labor imported on H-1B visas, is not unlike indentured servitude. It is far cheaper, more easily disposed, and thus more easily exploited (in part due to the ever-present threat of the visa being revoked due to termination). Furthermore, we already have a robust program for O-1 visas, which serve to bring the most elite international talent to the US. Expanding H-1B visas for this purpose is therefore a deliberately fallacious policy which will only serve to undermine the American middle class.

The sole purpose of these policies is not to build the best tech industry possible, but simply to maximize tech industry profits by undercutting our domestic talent at every turn. 

Every American who cast a vote in favor of policies that would prioritize the American worker has the right to feel betrayed and outraged that Trump has elevated those who vehemently oppose America First policies in the tech industry. We must stay vigilant, and stay vocal.