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Elon Musk is unabashedly pro-legal immigration, and on Christmas of all days, he ignited a firestorm by noting that a dearth of engineering talent in Silicon Valley is holding up progress on some of America’s most critical technological projects. 

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Elon is, of course, an immigrant–one of the most famous African Americans in the world, as are several high-profile entrepreneurs in the tech industry. 

To me his observation seemed anodyne, even obvious. America has a huge problem with illegal immigration, and there are plenty of indications that the H1B visa process is broken and needs to be fixed. But it is also true that America has been extremely good at skimming the cream off other, less free and prosperous societies, and that has helped drive America’s innovation economy. 

Immigration policy in America should obviously driven by the goal of improving America, not becoming a welfare magnet for the world. It isn’t just unfair to Americans to ask us to subsidize the well-being of non-Americans, but it undermines our long-term prosperity. 

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What was striking to me about the dispute was not that there was an argument about what the right immigrants can bring to America, but rather the level of hostility expressed to the idea of bringing in talent from around the world. I think it is true that America needs to up its game when it comes to producing engineers and other skilled individuals–too many Americans are getting ridiculous degrees in X-studies and too few are going into the STEM fields. 

Some of this is cultural–good times have made weak men, and too much of it is the cultural elite focusing on equity and “social justice.” K-12 in most places, at least outside the elite public schools and some private schools is less focused on achievement than some phony notion of social and emotional learning. 

This has been a problem for decades. My father, who taught Physics and Astronomy, told me decades ago that a huge proportion of his students were foreigners. He didn’t mind that the foreigners were coming here–it was great for him and the science programs–but he worried that Americans were choosing softer fields of study. 

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I’m not certain what started the entire dispute, but one of the factors that started the ball rolling was Trump’s naming Sriaram Krishnan to a senior position overseeing AI:

The funny thing is that Krishnan is not, as far as I can tell, pushing for increasing the H-1B visa numbers but rather for rejiggering the country limits on Green Cards, which is a totally different kettle of fish. The limits are not set rationally right now. H-1B visas are about importing temporary labor, often for medium-skilled programming jobs, not bringing in highly skilled immigrants to settle here, start businesses, settle down and become Americans. 

It’s not, then, about displacing Americans, making money, and sending remittances back home. 

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I don’t know what the appropriate level of immigration from India is, but I was shocked to see a full-blown war erupt, complete with attacks on Indians as a people, rather than a debate about the pros and cons of various immigration policies. Attacks went all the way up to Trump himself as abandoning America first, and Vivek Ramaswamy as not pro-America enough. 

Hundreds or more posts from supposed MAGA types filled my feed yesterday. I can’t tell if they were just the Groyper-types who seem angry at everything and everyone or whether there is a significant backlash against legal immigrants that goes beyond mere policy issues. But the hostility was real and directed at people, not policies. 

I don’t disagree with the argument that America shouldn’t depend on other countries for talent–we need a K-12 education system that focuses on education, developing talent and stops indoctrinating kids into race and gender-obsessed studies. We also need to foster risk-taking. Americans are dramatically less likely than immigrants to start businesses. 

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Our big problem with immigration is that to put it bluntly, we have been letting in the bottom feeders. Opening borders, spreading welfare dollars around, and justifying it by pointing to low-paid agricultural jobs needing to be filled is just stupid and destructive. We need people who want to climb the economic ladder and produce dramatic increases in value and productivity. 

It’s not about replacing Americans; it’s about strengthening American culture. Vivek Ramaswamy, Usha Vance, and legal immigrants from around the world make America stronger. Look at the people around Trump–patriotic, America-first, and color-blind. 

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I agree that H-1B visas have been a tool to exploit Americans and reduce wages for talented Americans. We don’t need to import cheap labor. But the H-1B visa abuse is far different from importing the best and the brightest from around the world. We need to invest in building human capital here through better education, getting rid of DEI, and promoting talent over nonsense social engineering. 

We should also recruit skilled and talented people who will start businesses and increase innovation. I am on board with that.