By Daily Mail (U.S.) | Created at 2025-01-01 05:41:31 | Updated at 2025-01-04 02:31:27
2 days ago
President-elect Donald Trump denied that he'd changed his position on H-1B visas after the subject fractured the MAGAverse in recent days.
Trump spoke to reporters on the red carpet as he and first lady Melania Trump arrived at his annual New Year's Eve bash at Mar-a-Lago.
The incoming commander-in-chief was asked why he changed his mind and publicly backed the H-1B visa program.
'I didn't change my mind,' Trump pushed back. 'I've always felt we have to have the most competent people in our country.'
He added, 'we need competent people, we need smart people coming into our country and we need a lot of people coming in, we're going to have jobs like we've never had before.'
'But sir, you changed your position!' the journalist responded.
Trump ignored the reporter, choosing to answer a question about whether he would attend President Jimmy Carter's funeral instead.
The president-elect said he would be there.
President-elect Donald Trump (left) denied that he'd changed his position on H-1B visas after the subject fractured the MAGAverse in recent days. He spoke with reporters as he arrived alongside Melania Trump (right) to Mar-a-Lago's New Year's Eve bash
The fight over H-1B visas split the Magaverse with Trump (right) siding with tech billionaire Elon Musk (left), who he publicly asked to be at Tuesday night's party. Musk indeed came with his son X in tow
The tussle over H-1B visas pit Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy - selected to run the newly created Department of Government Efficiency - against traditional MAGA mainstays like Steve Bannon.
As tech industry insiders, Musk and Ramaswamy were pro the visas that bring in high-skilled laborers, while Bannon and the MAGA right argued those jobs should go to Americans first.
Trump ended up siding with Musk and even posted publicly to Truth Social about his desire to see the X owner at the New Year's shindig.
'Where are you? When are you coming to the "Center of the Universe," Mar-a-Lago,' Trump wrote. 'We miss you and x! New Year’s Eve is going to be AMAZING!!!'
Elon indeed came to the fete, walking the red carpet with son X on his shoulders.
He was later spotted standing next to the incoming president and first lady in Mar-a-Lago's grand ballroom watching Lara Trump, the president-elect's daughter-in-law who served as a Republican National Committee co-chair, sing Tom Petty's 'I Won't Back Down.'
Bannon was seemingly not at the party, as the former Trump White House chief strategist didn't walk the red carpet.
During the row Bannon said of Musk: 'We're going to rip your face off.'
President-elect Donald Trump ignored the claim that he had changed positions on H1-B visas and answered a question about whether he would attend President Jimmy Carter's funeral instead
Bannon also called Musk a 'toddler' after the tech billionaire said of those against the program: 'Take a big step back and F*** YOURSELF in the face.'
In the past, Trump has said negative things about the H-1B visa program but also conceded that he uses those visas to hire some of his own workforce.
During a 2016 primary debate Trump called the visas 'very bad' and 'unfair' to American workers - the point Bannon, Laura Loomer and others on the MAGA right made in their spat with Musk and Ramaswamy.
'First of all, I think and I know the H-1B very well. And it’s something that I frankly use and I shouldn’t be allowed to use it. We shouldn’t have it,' Trump said at the time.
'Second of all, I think it’s very important to say, well, I’m a businessman and I have to do what I have to do,' he added.
Once taking office Trump's 'Buy American and Hire American' executive order directed Cabinet officers to suggest reforms to the H-1B program to do more to protect American jobs.
In October 2020, a month before the 2020 presidential election, the Trump White House announced a plan to severely curb H-1B visas going forward.
Trump lost the election a month later and was replaced by President Joe Biden that January.
