Tech lobbyists see new opportunities to expand access to high-skilled H-1B visas and green cards by leveraging the sway of Elon Musk over the GOP

A holiday blowup over immigration between Trump's tech advisers and the GOP base suggests the road may be littered with obstacles.

Politico 2024-12-27 Brendan Bordelon

Context & Ripple Effects

Musk’s growing role in Trump’s orbit had already encouraged right-leaning tech leaders to seek policy influence, as covered in tech leaders’ hopes of steering the incoming administration. The H-1B dispute exposes a fault line in that coalition: the industry’s demand for skilled workers conflicts with parts of the GOP base.

The debate follows renewed attention to the role of H-1B workers in U.S. technology leadership, including the case that foreign technical talent supports U.S. tech competitiveness. It matters because visa access is becoming a test of whether tech’s political alignment can translate into durable policy influence.

First-order effects

Tech lobbyists gain a clearer opening to press for expanded high-skilled visa and green-card access through Musk-aligned channels, while facing immediate resistance from immigration-restriction voices in the GOP.
Companies dependent on international technical hiring get a more visible political advocate, but no settled policy outcome; the public split makes workforce planning more politically contingent.

Second-order effects

Other business groups seeking skilled-worker access may join the push, while restrictionist factions are likely to demand tighter eligibility rules or employer obligations—echoing an earlier proposal to prioritize higher-paid visa applicants and domestic hiring.
The fight raises the value of alternative hiring locations and retention strategies for employers and visa holders if political conflict delays or narrows changes to U.S. immigration pathways.

Third-order effects

If this coalition holds, access to global technical talent could become a negotiated industrial-policy issue inside the Republican Party rather than a conventional business-lobbying priority.
If it does not, the episode would show the limits of tech executives’ partisan influence when their labor needs collide with the coalition’s immigration politics; subsequent visa uncertainty has already unsettled immigrant tech workers in Silicon Valley’s visa-dependent community.

The trend: High-skilled immigration is increasingly a strategic contest over whether political coalitions can reconcile tech’s global talent needs with nationalist immigration demands.

Discussion

@tomwellborn3 @tomwellborn3 on bluesky
Despite Musk's influence, anti-immigrant forces and MAGA fearmongering threaten to block reforms, stalling progress yet again. www.politico.com/new... 2/2
@malwaretech.com Marcus Hutchins on bluesky
All the Tech VCs backing Trump because they thought he'd deregulate tech, then losing access to H1-B & O-1 visas (which is how US tech companies poach all the skilled foreign workers and maintain absolute market dominance) would be a real funny case of “I didn't think the leopard…
@ignotumaliquis Secretary Designate on bluesky
👇👇👇👇 THIS! — The GOP doesn't actually care about an invasion of brown & yellow people as long as they are H-1B tech workers coming in from India & China to take jobs away from American tech workers (at lower wage rates, of course). Hint: Neither do the Democrats. …
@antiquequaalude Blake Brown on bluesky
In hist 1st term Trump had said he'd get rid of the H-1B visa abuse that companies utilize to pay lower wages to foreign workers and fire Americans. Never happened, of course.
@pwnallthethings @pwnallthethings on bluesky
Not the main thing here, but when real-life Einstein came to America, his visa was personally protested by organizations including the Women's Patriot Organization movement. If he were alive today, he'd as likely arrive under a refugee visa (or J-1) than under an O-1 [embedded p…
@sharonk Sharon Kuruvilla on bluesky
thiel capital has their talking points [image]
@carnage4life Dare Obasanjo on threads
Everyone who works in tech understands the reality of this charts below and that flat line has been flat regardless of who controls Congress or the White House for decades. The techies in the Trump admin have their work cut out for them to change this reality. I'll be happy if …
@carnage4life Dare Obasanjo on threads
There are two topics where Democrats and Republicans are aligned; slowing down the pace of immigration (legal & illegal) and more money for police is always good. The tech bros entering the Trump administration are on a collision course with the GOP base if they attempt to incre…
@davidaxelrod David Axelrod on x
This was one of the inevitable schisms between Elon and the billionaire techies who funded Trump's campaign, and the voters who elected him. They are globalists bankrolling a populist movement for their own purposes https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
@davidsacks David Sacks on x
Sriram has been a U.S. citizen for a decade. He's not “running America.” He's advising on A.I. policy. He will have no influence over U.S. immigration policy. These attacks have become crude, and not in the holiday spirit. I'm signing off now. Have a merry Christmas.🎄
@twobitidiot Ryan Selkis on x
Vivek did Trump a solid by provoking the H1B debate, because now DJT has a pulse check and more info on how best to tackle the challenge during the term. Thousands of ideas to pick and choose from, and no political downsides to watching the debate unfold from the golf course.
@noahpinion Noah Smith on x
“The racists we just allied with to win an election turning out to be racist” is not a psyop, guys. 😂 [image]
@elonmusk Elon Musk on x
@iamyesyouareno @MarioNawfal Your understanding of the situation is upside-down and backwards. OF COURSE my companies and I would prefer to hire Americans and we DO, as that is MUCH easier than going through the incredibly painful and slow work visa process. HOWEVER, there is a d…
r/Defeat_Project_2025 r on reddit
MAGA civil war breaks out over American “mediocrity” culture
r/centrist r on reddit
MAGA civil war breaks out over American “mediocrity” culture
r/conservatives r on reddit
MAGA civil war breaks out over American “mediocrity” culture
r/politics r on reddit
Right-wingers turn on Elon Musk over his latest immigration stance | ‘The mask is off.’
@romitmehta.com Romit Mehta on bluesky
Had a pretty pleasant Christmas Day watching NBA and NFL and in the process completely missed the anti-Indian campaign started by the MAGA right, specifically targeting Sriram and expanding it to all Indians and H-1B workers. — Can't say I did not see this coming, tbh. — x.co…
@thetnholler @thetnholler on bluesky
In-fighting : “The new MAGA coalition has officially had its first internal debate - over H-1b visas. It started when Trump appointed Sriram Krishnan...” — Elon & the tech bros shocked to realize they're in coalition with those who hate all immigrants.
@bucketlister88 @bucketlister88 on bluesky
Worked in tech with Indians on H-1B. Few were excellent (10%) remaining 90% were horrible. Their coding standards were sub-par and they'd push anything to production just to say they delivered. Our company experienced a huge shift in morale. The greater # of Indians the worse…
@walterolson Walter Olson on bluesky
TIL: the nativist lobby group that calls itself “US Tech Workers” doesn't actually represent any organized body of actual U.S. tech workers, and Its founder doesn't “appear to have ever done the type of job that an H-1b worker might be hired to do.” [embedded post]
@alternatebuild.dev @alternatebuild.dev on bluesky
imo “discover” here could be swapped for “finally forced to reckon with” — boy the related discourse on “the other site” makes me cynical, but we're going to remain optimistic! we can learn!
@gwensnyder @gwensnyder on bluesky
The world's richest man (from South Africa) and a Nazi propagandist from Malaysia spent their Christmas night complaining that the xenophobic base they helped manufacture to elect a nativist needs to understand that we still need to allow immigration for important groups like Naz…
@jdportes Jonathan Portes on bluesky
Ignoring the slightly clickbait title, @noahpinion.blogsky.venki.dev makes an important empirical point here about skilled immigration which is highly relevant to the current UK debate. — [1/n] — www.noahpinion.blog/p/indian- imm...
@anildash.com Anil Dash on bluesky
I used to know Sriram a long time ago; had coffee with him and met his wife and he told me he used to read my blog. After he fell in with the Andreessen types and became their pet during the Clubhouse era, I told him it was gonna end like this. We haven't spoken since, but... l…
@davidsacks David Sacks on x
@LauraLoomer @sriramk Point of clarification: Sriram didn't say he wants to remove all caps on green cards. He said he wants to remove *country* caps on green cards. Right now, every country in the world gets allocated the same number of green cards, no matter how many qualified …
@elonmusk Elon Musk on x
The “fixed pie” fallacy is at the heart of much wrong-headed economic thinking. There is essentially infinite potential for job and company creation. Think of all the things that didn't exist 20 or 30 years ago!
@nasescobar316 Nas on x
Did any of yall vote for this Indian to run America? [image]
@vivekgramaswamy Vivek Ramaswamy on x
The reason top tech companies often hire foreign-born & first-generation engineers over “native” Americans isn't because of an innate American IQ deficit (a lazy & wrong explanation). A key part of it comes down to the c-word: culture. Tough questions demand tough answers & if …
@shaunmmaguire Shaun Maguire on x
IMO the underlying issue on this “Tech vs MAGA” debate Is that anti white racism has been real in America for at least the last decade I've experienced it first hand It has created a lot of pain, as all racism does Most either don't appreciate this or are afraid to say it
@nic__carter @nic__carter on x
Trumps rainbow coalition of tech bros and blood and soil nationalists appears to have collapsed 25 days before he takes office
@antoniogm Antonio García Martínez on x
As a meta-comment, it's fascinating to see this debate play out live, in the gladiatorial arena, with near-zero meddling from the content moderation people or the mainstream media. The national agora at internet scale is here. Everything else is a sideshow.
@mattyglesias Matthew Yglesias on x
Cutting edge thinking: We have Indian-American CEOs at Google and Microsoft because of a Jewish plot to sabotage America.
@devahaz Deva Hazarika on x
There are two types of shocked right wing tech bros right now: 1) self-serving liars who thought they'd see no opposition to enriching their enterprises in any way they saw fit 2) people who don't care or know anything about MAGA or RW politics and just jumped on a bandwagon
@paulg Paul Graham on x
I don't think I've ever seen a Twitter dispute that was so one-sided. All the people who understand tech, on both right and left, are on one side, and the other side is just anonymous accounts and political commentators.
@balajis Balaji on x
Funny you mention that! Because Prafulla Dhariwal is an International Math Olympiad and International Physics Olympiad gold medalist with a 5.0 GPA from MIT. And he led the development of GPT-4o. [image]
@nic__carter @nic__carter on x
I do think serious questions need to be asked of the H1B system and how it affects the wages of Americans tech workers, but the right way to open that discussion is not via a xenophobic tirade against one of our best.
@lauraloomer Laura Loomer on x
Deeply disturbing to see the appointment of Sriram Krishnan @sriramk as Senior Policy Advisor for AI at the Office of Science and Technology Policy. It's alarming to see the number of career leftists who are now being appointed to serve in Trump's admin when they share views [ima…
@kiarichards_ Kia Richards on x
Observing the clash between MAGA loyalists and the Tech Right over immigration feels like the ultimate “I told you so” moment for Black Americans. We warned other POCs that the “America First” narrative was coded language for a white ethno-state, which doesn't include them.
@micah_erfan Micah Erfan on x
Team neonazi vs Team techbro [image]
@mcuban Mark Cuban on x
In an AI world, where free online sources of information have already been used as training data, and new sources are being siloed, as owned IP, don't we need more people with varied expertise, including Liberal Arts, to contribute to models, to correct hallucinations, and to
@byyourlogic @byyourlogic on x
this is one of the funniest posts I have ever seen in my life. I've never seen a guy misjudge things quite like this. he spent YEARS pretending to laugh at Babylon Bee headlines so he could post this!
@mattyglesias Matthew Yglesias on x
We must reject both the prom queen and the math olympiad champ in favor of America's true heroes, the goths.
@kelewarg @kelewarg on x
It's not wild. It is the seed that was sown with the heavy anti-immigration rhetoric. The thing with any heavily negative emotionally-driven wave targeting the “other”, especially if you're not part of the in-group, is you get burned eventually.
@josephpolitano @josephpolitano on x
this is mostly a lot of text to say little of substance, but try to imagine the backlash if Harris had said in so many words “the reason we take in a ton of immigrants right now is because you jock worshippers don't have the culture for success” [image]
@financeguy725 Kyle O'Hehir on x
I didn't go to a top-tier university I got a front office job on the buyside out of undergrad This is a skill issue/cope
@politicalmath PoIiMath on x
I'm looking for a job in the tech industry, which puts me in a weird space with the debate over visas and tech workers On the one hand, I can honestly say that I have never personally worked with an H1B visa holder who I thought was stealing an American job I have worked with
@armanddoma Armand Domalewski on x
foreign students pay way more than American ones do, so if you kicked them out, *fewer* Americans would get a college education because the latter subsidizes the former
@nickyfrank30 Nicky Frank on x
Me watching MAGA go after Indian immigrants after Indian-Americans swung to Trump. [image]
@sturgeons_law @sturgeons_law on x
I'm surprised the tech right is flaunting their open contempt for the populist MAGA types before Trump is even in office.
@nobleqali Q. Anthony Ali on x
I know this man has been waiting his WHOLE LIFE to give this speech I'm fuckin deceased this is Beat It Chick for the stinky lunches kids ☠️☠️☠️ [image]
@noahpinion Noah Smith on x
Immigration is our superpower
@justalexoki @justalexoki on x
imagine trolling an entire website so hard people with millions of followers try to get you fired and your CEO replies “🔥🤣” [image]
@armanddoma Armand Domalewski on x
at the end of the day, a lot of nativist sentiment is just “crabs in a bucket” stupidity. as if deporting a bunch of Indians is going to magically spawn an army of Applachian machine learning engineers
@buccocapital @buccocapital on x
Tech bros forming a coalition with nativists and white supremacists to elect Trump [image]
@krishnanrohit Rohit on x
“I'm not good enough to get hired but I will do the job at double the salary” is quite an offer [image]
@ronfilipkowski Ron Filipkowski on x
BREAKING: MAGA has suddenly realized the Tech Bros are globalists.
@johncardillo John Cardillo on x
This is one of the most offensive things I've read. America and Americans are not mediocre. India is a filthy third world hellscape. If it's so exceptional, why doesn't its tech talent want to stay there?
@eigenrobot @eigenrobot on x
man. idk the number of posts ive seen like this is genuinely shocking to me and makes me more inclined to support obnoxious immigration restrictions tbqh something is going very badly wrong with integration if this is a common expressive response among indians
@krishnanrohit Rohit on x
Look, let's use this example as a platform to talk about immigration. This because I'm quite sure eigen isn't a racist. So, first, immigration isn't just about economics. It's naturally fraught. People dislike culture drift, blame outsiders for their ills. Tale as old as time.
@0xkarmatic Karma on x
If Thiel would be looking at what Vivek and Elon are saying right now, he would tell them turn their phones off and not post for a while. Learn how to read the room.
@mcuban Mark Cuban on x
How do you feel about people who say “college is over rated ?” In order to have more homegrown engineers, don't we need more kids going to college ?
@lokijulianus @lokijulianus on x
Elon got ratio'd sticking up for H1-B's. Tough scenes ...
@aravsrinivas Aravind Srinivas on x
🧐
@realgeorgehotz George Hotz on x
Most engineers are not in America, a simple fact about population size. Why discriminate based on country? Sounds very DEI. We discriminate based on skill and work ethic. If you prove yourself through our bounties, both @comma_ai and @__tinygrad__ would love to hire you.
@luke_metro @luke_metro on x
the tech industry before and after the general public discovers what an H1B is [image]
@nikkihaley Nikki Haley on x
There is nothing wrong with American workers or American culture. All you have to do is look at the border and see how many want what we have. We should be investing and prioritizing in Americans, not foreign workers.
@ichthys30 Sulla on x
Really weird to me how every person here says they put in 100 applications and got no call backs and every business owner on X said they put out job openings and got zero applications from natives and just HAVE to hire H1-B. Really makes you think ....
@devahaz Deva Hazarika on x
I don't think “Americans need to turn all their kids into a bunch of super nerds or get replaced by foreigners” is the winning conservative message Vivek seems to believe it is
@mattyglesias Matthew Yglesias on x
I think it's 100 percent accurate to say that the idea of expanding legal immigration of skilled workers was rejected at the ballot box when Trump won. But it's still a good idea, and Trump frequently lies to and betrays his supporters, so he should do it on this.
@jeremykauffman Jeremy Kauffman on x
Everyone sees Indian immigration the way they've experienced it: 1 - High-tech and elite firms see the exceptionally talented with no equivalent American substitute. 2 - The low- and mid-tier tech worker is familiar with Indian department takeovers. 3 - Average Americans have
@sevaut Seva on x
watching the techno-reactionaries battle the ethno-reactionaries over immigration [image]
@lionel_trolling John Ganz on x
The big contradiction on the right now is that immigrant voters are proving themselves to be pretty open to right-wing politics but the movement's racists are like “No this is about us white people”
@rubirosarevival Rubirosa on x
IT outsourcing firm Cognizant has received 52k H1B visas since 2009, more than any other American company. Almost all went to Indians. In October a federal jury ruled the company had intentionally discriminated against more than 2,000 non-Indian employees employed from 2013-22. […
@rsanti97 Santi Ruiz on x
Every advocate for high-skilled immigration I know has been flagging these issues with the H1B for years.
@x_rahulraj Rahul Raj on x
Sriram Krishnan will face backlash in USA because American public don't want talented Indians to fix things for their country Sriram Krishnan will struggle in India because Indian politicians don't want talented Indians to fix things for their country
@armanddoma Armand Domalewski on x
the idea that the only reason Silicon Valley is full of Indian and Chinese software engineers is the Civil Rights Act is genuinely so funny. you dumb fucks
@growing_daniel Daniel on x
Why do people who don't like immigrants even care about the h1b thing. This is a small number of immigrants and most of them go to a city that you would not step foot in. They're also highly civilized intelligent people. Aren't you mad about Venezuelan gangs
@mattyglesias Matthew Yglesias on x
Before he became a politician, this was @JDVance's thing — applying the traditional conservative critique of African-American culture to the white working class, and criticizing Trump for cynically exploiting that pathology rather than addressing it.
@appyg99 Apoorva Govind on x
4/ if you want to fix the H1B issue, remove lotteries, reject the Indian service agencies from gaming the system, introduce a points system like the rest of the world. Set a high bar for what qualifies as skilled immigration.
@appyg99 Apoorva Govind on x
I've been on both sides of the H1B Visa.For context, I graduated with a Masters degree from Carnegie Mellon, interned at Nvidia, worked at Apple, then at Uber & eventually started my own company. Every year the US grants 85,000 H1Bs. For context, approx 2.1M ppl immigrate
@copyconstruct Cindy Sridharan on x
Many “anti-DEI” legal immigrants who celebrated Trump are now realizing that “America first” is fundamentally incompatible with their dreams of “global meritocracy”. And that Trump's core base is comprised of people who find their presence in America to be rather undesirable. [im…
@quantian1 @quantian1 on x
VIVEK NO YOU'RE A REPUBLICAN NOW!!! YOU CAN'T SAY PEOPLE ARE UNSUCCESSFUL BECAUSE OF A DYSFUNCTIONAL CULTURE, LACK OF POSITIVE ROLE MODELS, AND AN ENTITLED VICTIM MENTALITY!!! NO VIVEK THEY'RE WHITE PEOPLE!!! YOU HAVE TO SAY IT'S STRUCTURAL FORCES AND NOT THEIR FAULT VIVEK!!! [im…
@auronmacintyre Auron MacIntyre on x
The h1-b visa doesn't exist to get you the once in a generation talent That's the o-1 visa and it will continue to exist The h1-b is exploited to replace the middle class
@nkulw Noah Kulwin on x
I am a fan of the H-1B visa but I do not support the underpaid immigrants it brings over nor the people they are meant to replace [pelted with trash, canceled permanently]
@teroterotero Tero Kuittinen on x
OK now I'm getting nervous as a Finnish American LOL... getting kind of Weimary
@steinkobbe @steinkobbe on x
Suddenly they have an issue with the fact Vivek got rich from scamming people after he said tech companies should be allowed to hire foreigners [image]
@teroterotero Tero Kuittinen on x
Vivek really thinks he can win over these people by helpfully pointing out that a smart Indian is better than a dim white American. He truly is just grabbing a live wire with both hands while giving that big toothy grin. Like that Squid Games dude yelling “Not My Fault!!”
@hodgetwins @hodgetwins on x
Americans should be hired and trained before any foreigner Don't know how this is controversial 🤷🏾‍♂️
@rakeshsfnyc Rakesh Agrawal on x
I know I'm in a bubble, but I'm glad we're having a serious discussion on high-skilled immigration. It hasn't been purely one-sided; some in tech world are calling for reform of H-1B abuses. 🤞🏾it turns into a real policy discussion versus just as shouting match. I've worked
@teroterotero Tero Kuittinen on x
He keeps talking... he dimly realizes he is in a lot of trouble with his base, but he keeps digging himself deeper... this is fascinating in a grotesque sort of manner.
@mayankseksaria Mayank Seksaria on x
[image]
@alecstapp Alec Stapp on x
Only 14% of US residents are immigrants. But immigrants are responsible for 36% of aggregate innovation. Two-thirds of this contribution is due to making their native-born collaborators better. [image]
@noahpinion Noah Smith on x
Amazing community note
@noahpinion Noah Smith on x
In fact, native-born Americans CAN fulfill tech jobs. They don't have a skill deficit. But the number of jobs is NOT FIXED. When we hire more H-1bs and other skilled foreigners, corporations invest more in America, and native-born people get MORE tech jobs and higher wages!
@noahpinion Noah Smith on x
Yes to all of these except “more liked or respected abroad”, and that one is on you
@noahpinion Noah Smith on x
The fact is, America has only 4% of the world's population. You can't be the center of the global tech industry if your talent pool is only 4% of the population, no matter how talented that 4% is. We need to draw on the whole world for talent to stay at the center of things.
@cremieuxrecueil @cremieuxrecueil on x
People love to brag about their country doing better than America in mathematics competitions. But that doesn't matter. America ultimately receives a massively disproportionate number of IMO medalists. [image]
@armanddoma Armand Domalewski on x
these people will go on about how we shouldn't import talent from abroad but invest in talent at home and then argue we should massively defund public education and abolish the Department of Education. They don't actually believe in anything, they're just bitter angry losers [ima…
@noahpinion Noah Smith on x
The fight on the Right over Indian immigration is a reminder of why we used to have this useful term called “racist” that we could use to dismiss people who obviously just want a future of chaos and destruction for America. [image]
@noahpinion Noah Smith on x
Sorry, rightists. Indian immigrants are making America great! https://www.noahpinion.blog/ ...
@mattyglesias Matthew Yglesias on x
Winning a Poaster War against the groypers over visas for skilled workers is a lot easier than engaging in the legislative dealmaking needed to enact statutory changes to improve and expand the H1B system or replace it with something bigger and better.
@trueanonpod @trueanonpod on x
Vivek intervenes in the MAGA civil war by saying the reason tech companies need to bring H1-B visa employees over is because Americans failed to venerate Steve Urkel
@businessbarista Alex Lieberman on x
@levie @AlecStapp the #1 macroeconomic moat on the planet. why we need to continue to make sure the U.S. is a marketable product to the best & brightest
@armanddoma Armand Domalewski on x
the tactic of course is to spew endless insane racist shit against Indians all day, and then find a random Indian guy who popped off in a crass way, and say this justifies the insane racist shit in the first place [image]
@plzbepatient @plzbepatient on x
When Donald Trump was lying prone on a stage in Butler, PA, blood dripping down his face, he realized at that moment a true sense of purpose: uncapped immigration from India
@grantslatton Grant Slatton on x
it's weird that there is this conspiracy that big tech companies use h-1b visa employees to avoid hiring americans we hired everyone we could find — americans, chinese, indians, russians, whatever most were just simply not good enough, including many americans
@grantslatton Grant Slatton on x
The nationalist responses to this are basically “you should hire low-agency uneducated Americans like me and teach me the things Zhang and Pradeep taught themselves on a $20 android phone” What did you get done last week?
@dvassallo Daniel Vassallo on x
Musk really gets it here. Education is important, but not sufficient. With the internet everyone has access to all the necessary education. What varies greatly between people is the motivation to learn and keep learning. [image]
@pitdesi Sheel Mohnot on x
Midwit take: Indians can't found companies Reality: H-1B's tie immigrants to employers, making it hard to start companies. Indians rose to CEO roles bc they couldn't leave to build their own Country quotas mean decades-long green card waits for founders like @AravSrinivas 😢
@garrytan Garry Tan on x
Keep skilled immigration legal [image]
@teroterotero Tero Kuittinen on x
Heartbreaking to see American CEOs trying to make sensible arguments to persuade MAGA. Can they really be this naive?
@basedbeffjezos @basedbeffjezos on x
Maybe we phrase high-skilled immigration as critical talent acquisition and adversarial skill exfiltration from opponents. The US needs to continue to Project Paperclip all other countries at all times to stay on top. Maintain US tech dominance is paramount to protect freedom.
@grimezsz @grimezsz on x
Suddenly concocting anti Indian energy out of nowhere is embarrassing yall. Also, they were clear they planned to do this. My step dad's Indian, I had a fire childhood in a half Indian household. Indian culture jives very well w western culture.
@alecstapp Alec Stapp on x
This is 100% right. We should be doing everything we can to attract top global talent. Let's build a superteam and win forever. [image]
@tracewoodgrains @tracewoodgrains on x
this sounds cocky but is entirely true most fields are talent-constrained in major ways that become apparent as soon as you focus on anything specific that requires competence take journalism. many more important stories to tell than top-tier writers to tell them
@gavinwax Gavin Mario Wax on x
I have a friend whose entire job used to be interviewing American job applicants to claim that they were unqualified so the company could hire a cheaper H1B1 applicant. They never intended to hire Americans. The entire thing is a sick fraud. “Good faith recruiting” my ass.
@therabbithole84 @therabbithole84 on x
From the article: “Sixty percent of the highest-valued tech companies were co-founded by first- or second-generation immigrants.” [image]
@armanddoma Armand Domalewski on x
these people just openly want to make America a vastly poorer country. just incredible
@graduatedben Dr. Ben Braddock on x
A modest proposal that will make everyone happy: Move Silicon Valley to India. Founders, VCs, employees, entire companies. Build a replica of San Francisco at Navi Mumbai. Silicon Valley gets cheap engineers, and we get rid of Silicon Valley. Win-Win
@bgurley Bill Gurley on x
Big fan and supporter of @sriramk. Feel fortunate that he has volunteered to serve.
@lauraloomer Laura Loomer on x
This X employee wants you to know that “America wouldn't exist if it wasn't for Indian excellence”. Bio says he is an engineer at @x. [image]
@yacinemtb Kache on x
I guess I can't be surprised that people don't know how difficult it is to find and hire a team of top .001 percentile operators, because they aren't top .001 percentile operators and could never be even if they tried
@stillgray Ian Miles Cheong on x
Are you trying to cancel 𝕏 employees now.
@scottbelsky Scott Belsky on x
another example of the spread of inaccuracy via algo polarization...sending extra special holiday vibes to my friend @sriramk who is battling plenty of misinfo and worse at the moment. but bigger pic: excited to see smart and dedicated minds in tech determined to fix things.
@mattyglesias Matthew Yglesias on x
I don't think it's true that we built the bomb or went to the moon without foreign-born talent. [image]
@themagahulk Lucky on x
My wife worked for a company that was purchased by a private equity firm that immediately brought in an Indian CEO. He pushed out all the founders and replaced all the C-suite with Indians. He used Covid as excuse to force every employee to take a “temporary” 10% pay cut and he
@baxate_carter @baxate_carter on x
let me get this straight, you want companies to favor american workers even if they aren't as qualified as their H1-B counterparts purely because the american was born here some might call that an inalienable trait. So the people who are against DEI, want a DEI program to
@suhail @suhail on x
The open racism of Indians is a gift from the weak minded to us that we need to plan for the future. This is just the beginning.
@levie Aaron Levie on x
High skilled immigration has been central to America leading the world in tech. The biggest misunderstand about high skill immigration stems from people thinking that the market opportunities in tech, and tech-adjacent fields, are zero sum. This essentially imagines innovation
@paulg Paul Graham on x
@levie The problem with the phrase “zero sum” is that the kind of people who mistakenly believe things are zero-sum tend not to know what it means...
@alecstapp Alec Stapp on x
There is not a fixed number of tech jobs in the US. When we block skilled immigration, companies just hire more in foreign countries. Letting talented people move here is the ultimate win-win. [image]
@ritchietorres Ritchie Torres on x
The personal attacks on Sriram Krishnan are disgraceful. Sriram is an American Dream success story. He represents what is best about America, and his haters represent what is worst. America should be defined not by color but by creed.
@jackposobiec Jack Poso on x
J.D. Vance: New Congress Must Go After Corporations Replacing Americans with Foreign H-1B Visa Workers https://www.breitbart.com/...
@growing_daniel Daniel on x
When I was a little kid I dreamed of someday becoming a Senior White House Policy Advisor on Artificial Intelligence. Then an immigrant stole my job
@davidu David Ulevitch on x
The funny thing about the Sriram hubbub, which is really a nothing burger except on X, is that he renounced his Indian citizenship to become a US citizen, which is a lot more of a commitment to America than most people make. 🙂🇺🇸💯
@firstadopter Tae Kim on x
Immigration is America's superpower. The U.S. has dominated global technology by attracting the world's best and brightest talent. Satya Nadella, Microsoft's CEO who guided the company's transition to cloud and created trillions in value, was born in India.
@richardhanania Richard Hanania on x
“If they're so smart, they can build their own country” I love when white proles who have done nothing in their miserable lives think that they're Edison or John Rockefeller. The CEOs of major tech companies have done a lot more to build the country than you, sorry to tell you. […
@eyeslasho @eyeslasho on x
Let me express this another way: A reason that Indian-Americans may get more “hate” than East Asian-Americans is because they share more of the often-unpleasant personality features of European-ancestry Americans: They're more likely to be aggressive, individualistic,
@bennpeifert @bennpeifert on x
Don't think being a model minority will satisfy the racists Don't bring them in as political partners and be surprised racism is their priority Don't stoke racism against blacks, mexicans and middle easterners and be shocked when they come for educated Indians Don't be
@richardhanania Richard Hanania on x
Usually, we should stick to ideas and not focus on credentials. But when your entire thing is racism, and you want to take credit for what previous generations have built, you have made it about identity. It becomes fair game to point out how unaccomplished these racists are. [im…
@catehall Cate Hall on x
The Discourse about whether it's bad to let cheap H1B labor undercut American workers is incredible because employers ***aren't allowed to pay H1B employees less than their American counterparts*** In practice it is substantially MORE expensive to employ H1Bs
@boonafterboon Boon on x
blaming immigrants because of skill issue, classic
@andrewyng Andrew Ng on x
One of the best things the U.S. can do is make high-skill immigration easier. @levie is right. It is awful that the wait time for a green card can be over a decade, and that after waiting years someone can still be forced to leave simply because they lost a job. Fixing this is
@presentwitness_ @presentwitness_ on x
Now that H-1B has become a topic of discussion, here's my story: Born in Appalachia, went to a top-tier university, interned in wealth management and trading, recruited for all the top investment banks and research firms, only offer I received was to cold call South American
@rokhanna Ro Khanna on x
Yes, I am proud of his support. I am for reforming the H1-B system. And I guess the test of your influence with the new President is whether @sriramk will have his role. My money is on him. Having people smart about tech and the future of AI is good for America.
@josephpolitano @josephpolitano on x
a smarter man than David would perhaps realize a campaign stoking anti immigrant backlash against Mexicans, Haitians, Guatemalans, etc would inevitably lead to anti immigration backlash against Indian tech workers. Don't play with fire and then say it's a psyop when you get burnt
@alecstapp Alec Stapp on x
New all-time favorite community note just dropped [image]
@elonmusk Elon Musk on x
@Austen Exactly
@austen Austen Allred on x
Look, two things are true: 1. H1B is used to bring in absolutely brilliant engineers, without whom American competitiveness diminishes and the entire US economy is harmed. 2. H1B is poorly implemented and abused like crazy.
@harmlessyarddog @harmlessyarddog on x
A white dude applied to work at X for free, didn't even get a response. There are ethnic mafias inside tech HR, this is an open secret. [image]
@teroterotero Tero Kuittinen on x
Elon getting devoured by his pet tiger
@kurtschlichter Kurt Schlichter on x
There's an easy solution to the H1-B “highly skilled” visa issue. Since it's so vital we have foreigners coming in because there are allegedly not enough Americans, companies who want them can pay $50K a year tax on each visa worker they hire. If they are that essential...
@annagorisch Anna K. Gorisch on x
If I could destroy just one immigration myth, it would be the claim that it's cheaper for employers to hire someone with an H-1B. It is exactly the opposite. Filing fees for one H-1B are about $5k, then there are lawyers. You also have to retain an employee to manage internal
@sarthakgh Sar Haribhakti on x
Those most outraged about companies allegedly hiring on H1 to save costs clearly have no idea how many hoops workers and companies have to jump through to get H1s It is exceptionally hard to compete with citizens who are much easier and cheaper to hire in competitive industries
@thestalwart Joe Weisenthal on x
Vivek Ramaswamy says the reason US companies hire foreign born talent is because of the degeneracy of American culture, which prizes jocks over nerds, and Stefan over Urkel in Saved By The Bell [image]
@parikpatelcfa @parikpatelcfa on x
The CEO of Google is Indian The CEO of Microsoft is Indian The CEO of Adobe is Indian The CEO of IBM is Indian The CEO of Chanel is Indian The CEO of FedEx is Indian The CEO of Palo Alto Networks is Indian The CEO of Perplexity is Indian So yes. Indians are “high skilled
@parikpatelcfa @parikpatelcfa on x
Community notes remain undefeated [image]
@parikpatelcfa @parikpatelcfa on x
If Indian immigrants are so bad for America why did America name a whole state after us [image]
@dmitry140 Dmitry Shevelenko on x
I'm an American who is gainfully employed because an Indian immigrant on a visa founded a company in the US. Thx @AravSrinivas for creating 100+ American jobs.
@sarthakgh Sar Haribhakti on x
Try looking up roles played by Indian immigrants in the invention of pentium microprocessor, hotmail, ethernet switching, java, usb, transformer that power the current llm wave, and much more
@paulg Paul Graham on x
As a rule the people who know the most about something are the pros whose incomes depend on doing it well. The pros at judging tech talent are venture capitalists. If venture capitalists' opinions differ from white nationalists', it's clear who's more likely to be right.
@parikpatelcfa @parikpatelcfa on x
I came to America on an H-1B visa The process was a shitshow and I was very lucky to be picked in the lottery U.S immigration is broken, but the answer isn't making it harder for talented and hardworking people to come here
@parikpatelcfa @parikpatelcfa on x
What's the word for when someone takes the actions of two individuals who happen to share a common heritage and generalizes them to an entire race?
@jlippincott_ Josiah Lippincott on x
“These third worlders with fake credentials are HARDER workers and SMARTER than you and your neighbors. You need to let them rule over you.” Nope!
@stillgray Ian Miles Cheong on x
There would be no 𝕏 if it wasn't for the skilled immigrants who helped make it what it is today under the direction of Elon Musk, a skilled immigrant. [image]
@wolfejosh Josh Wolfe on x
Truth. India is an important US ally and we should be doing more not less against shared threats especially those that wish us both harm.
@jlippincott_ Josiah Lippincott on x
These are the two Twitter executives who banned my account for 2 and a half years without cause. So, yes, I have an axe to grind with “high skill” Indian migrants. [image]
@firstadopter Tae Kim on x
Only in America could an immigrant like Jensen Huang—who started by cleaning bathrooms, washing dishes and attending a state school—meet Curtis and Chris at Denny's, get VC funding and cofound the world's most consequential company Nvidia. Immigration is America's superpower.
@noahpinion Noah Smith on x
H-1b workers are good for the economy. And on an unrelated note, all the rightists now bashing Indians on X and other platforms are full of crap. https://www.noahpinion.blog/ ...
@parikpatelcfa @parikpatelcfa on x
As long as we hating on Indians let's cancel my college roommate Sheel Patel fuck that guy he still owes me $35
@levie Aaron Levie on x
This chart shows the net migration levels of inventors to and from countries. America has more inventors coming here than all countries combined. This is our economic secret weapon that has been tuned for hundreds of years. [image]
@yacinemtb Kache on x
“noooooooooo hire me please nooooooo i can't compete noooooooooo”
@raghavendrapv Raghav V P on x
How do you not see the economic contributions of the highly-skilled immigrants? Is it that you want to keep this class of contributors oppressed? I hope you see the broader picture that prioritizes highly-skilled immigrants (and not beneficiaries of chain immigration) is an
@mrinconcruz Manny on x
Laura makes a good point—removing caps as Sriram suggests would create an application spamming situation. Which by the way is already the case with applications from India in many areas, including student visas. My own take is that Srirams position is unwise. The skilled
@theworthyhouse Charles Haywood on x
The reason Musk wants more Indians is because he knows that to get to Mars, he needs top talent RIGHT NOW, and he can skim the cream of Indians to do so. Rebuilding American education, on the other hand, will take decades, and require a birth rate reversal, neither of which can
@jackposobiec Jack Poso on x
Removing caps for green cards / H1B is a nonstarter
@theworthyhouse Charles Haywood on x
Musk's claim that there are not enough “talented and motivated” engineers in America may be true, but the reason for it is decades of vicious hobbling of white men. For example, it is extremely difficult for white men to get into top engineering programs at a university. Most
@pitdesi Sheel Mohnot on x
GOP has been far more aligned than the dems. Helped win the election Skilled immigration is causing a fissure though. Many on the right do not want ANY immigrants in this country, esp Indians. 47 has picked well so I think we're good but the Groypers are out in full force
@cloudwatch199 Sidharth on x
LauraLoomer , your tweet is a masterclass in ignorance wrapped in xenophobia. Sriram Krishnan's (@sriramk )appointment is a reflection of expertise and leadership—qualities you seem incapable of recognizing. Silicon Valley wasn't built by clinging to outdated fantasies; it
@matt_levine_1 Matt Levine on x
All rhetoric against H-1B visas is basically: “I'm losing in the labor market, but I want a participation trophy anyway” Workers compete vs. each other. If one works at a combination of [quality / speed / cost] superior to the other, the former wins. Train harder next time!
@nasescobar316 Nas on x
@AllTheInternets It's what makes America weak. They have shut American Workers out of the workforce in favor of H1-B Indians. The only people who benefit are India, Greedy Tech Companies & Greedy Investors. American Citizens are the ones losing in this situation.
@rishijoesanu Malabar ChRishimas on x
When will American right wingers learn that country caps on immigration is a DEI policy? America leaves Indian Physics Olympiad winners on the table in favor of Costa Rican farmers because of country caps
@luke_metro @luke_metro on x
Need a podcast where Laura Loomer debates venture capitalists
@tanknothink Lorenzo on x
what “American STEM students” lol
@tunguz Bojan Tunguz on x
LOL, yeah, the largely pro-immigration technocratic Silicon Valley libertarians and the nativist, isolationist, rural anti-tech right have very little in common aside from the loathing for the anti-free-speech woke Left. It will be interesting to see how long this alliance can
@fischerking64 FischerKing on x
Repeat observation, but there is something absurd about importing ‘high-skilled’ foreigners at the same time as the USA has been eliminating advanced programs in public schools that might identify domestic talent - all in the name of DEI. We don't even know how much domestic
@alltheinternets Zeb Anderson on x
@nasescobar316 Indian Americans are literally running the most successful (also American) companies in the world. Sundar Pichai (Google), Satya Nadella (Microsoft), Arvind Krishna (IBM), etc. It's what makes America great brother.
@mattyglesias Matthew Yglesias on x
Who could have predicted crude immigration-related attacks coming from the Trump movement? [image]
@davidsacks David Sacks on x
Who took your free speech away // Who gave it back [image]
@elonmusk Elon Musk on x
@stclairashley We need to fix the legal immigration process
@davidsacks David Sacks on x
It's a different person with the same name. If you knew anything about tech, you might even know he's a VC at a different firm. Have you told the President yet? Maybe it's time to stop with this crusade before you embarrass yourself further.
@mattyglesias Matthew Yglesias on x
@JTLonsdale What are low-end H1B immigrants?
@davidmarcus David Marcus on x
This whole cabal against @sriramk is totally out of control. There's no self serving agenda whatsoever here, nor character flaws. We should celebrate people like Sriram who are going to leave so much $ on the table to serve the country. Enough of this nonsense.
@vivekgramaswamy Vivek Ramaswamy on x
America-First means we want America to WIN. Playing for second place doesn't cut it.
@davidsacks David Sacks on x
@LauraLoomer @sriramk I agree there's a contradiction. You'll be happy to know that no one on the AI team will be working on immigration policy so their views on green cards are irrelevant. I think we can also agree that before even discussing legal immigration, we should complet…
@davidsacks David Sacks on x
Number of illegal aliens/year: 3+ million. Number of employment visas/year: 140k. As a start, maybe we should focus on the 95% where we all agree.
@lauraloomer Laura Loomer on x
@DavidSacks @sriramk Average tech policy bro: “AI is going to put software engineers out of work within 5 years!” Also average tech policy bro: “We need to import tens of thousands more software engineers from India!” Which one is it, @DavidSacks? You should let us know what thes…
@rmsherman Rob Sherman on x
.@sriramk was one of the first PMs I worked with after joining Facebook 12+ yrs ago. I don't know yet if I'll agree with all his views on AI, but he's highly qualified. We should all want someone with his expertise advising @realDonaldTrump & @DavidSacks on how the US can lead on
@davidsacks David Sacks on x
Actually, I completely trust @StephenM to handle immigration policy in the White House. What I oppose is a baseless witch hunt against a highly qualified American for a role as A.I. adviser.
@elonmusk Elon Musk on x
@iamyesyouareno @MarioNawfal It comes down to this: do you want America to WIN or do you want America to LOSE. If you force the world's best talent to play for the other side, America will LOSE. End of story.
@basedtorba Andrew Torba on x
This “tech labor shortage” is total nonsense. They think you're stupid. If you're a White male engineer in this country and you're unemployed right now you can't even get an interview because many of the hiring managers at top tech firms are Indian and only hire their own.
@elonmusk Elon Musk on x
@MarioNawfal No, we need more like double that number yesterday! The number of people who are super talented engineers AND super motivated in the USA is far too low. Think of this like a pro sports team: if you want your TEAM to win the championship, you need to recruit top talen…
@bgmasters Blake Masters on x
End H-1B and keep the O-1 visa. We want Einstein and Von Neumann to come here, not armies of foreign “tech workers”
@matt_levine_1 Matt Levine on x
This clash between the MAGA-right and the Tech-right over skilled immigration is just an appetizer, btw The main course is going to be when the MAGA-right discovers that most of the Tech-right leadership are married homosexual men
@jamessurowiecki James Surowiecki on x
This is exactly like saying, “There are over 330 million Americans. Surely there must be enough great basketball players among them to build the best team. Why would you bring foreigners like Nikola Jokic and Luka Doncic and Giannis and Wemby here to play for American teams?” [im…
@levie Aaron Levie on x
This high skilled immigration debate is wild because you have a lot of people who don't build things commenting on the type of talent it takes to build things.
@armanddoma Armand Domalewski on x
Laura Loomer, a woman whose sole talent seems to be publicly humiliating herself over and over and over, is lecturing machine learning engineers about what it takes to build software. What a joke
@balajis Balaji on x
Consider two photos. The first is full of native-born Americans. These are the NYT Democrats who pushed for uncontrolled inflation, child castration, limitless taxation, illegal immigration, gun confiscation, and subway immolation. They also censored Republicans on social [image]
@jtlonsdale Joe Lonsdale on x
My friend Sriram is America First. For USA to have the highest standard of living, generous govt services, and strongest military, we need to recruit the best and brightest and build the best companies. I'm against more low-end H1B immigrants; but let's win at the talent game.
@theworthyhouse Charles Haywood on x
America for the Americans. Everyone else, GTFO.
r/thedavidpakmanshow r on reddit
Indian immigration is great for America
r/neoliberal r on reddit
Indian immigration is great for America
r/ProfessorFinance r on reddit
Indian immigration is great for America

Chronicles