I voted for Trump and an immigrant and I'm mixed on immigration.
I've been in the US for 29 years now and I'm a US citizen. I'm more American in attitude than most Americans I know.
I consider myself a nationalist. Immigration has been both good and bad for America and both sides in this debate are being super dishonest.
First and foremost, I strongly believe that elected representatives should represent the best interests of their citizens and ONLY their citizens. The best interest of potential future citizens is not something they should even give a thought to.
Some immigration is in the best interest of the citizens of a country. Skimming the top 0.1% or maybe even just the top 0.01% of the best and the brightest abroad absolutely is in the best interests of Americans. That's the question that should be asked when admitting an immigrant: "Is this person a net benefit to the citizens of this country I was elected to represent?"
If the answer to that question is "Yes", then the next question should be "How should we admit this person to come work in the US so that Americans get the benefits and we mitigate any downside from allowing them in?"
Neither of these questions are being asked.
A country is basically a team like Elon said and we are in competition with other teams like Europe, China, India, etc. It is worth building out the best team, but that can't be done in a way where you hurt the citizens you were elected to represent.
Before I continue, one big point about American citizens. They aren't all white as has been misrepresented in this debate. A lot of them are first and second generation non-whites. American-born folks of Indian, Chinese, Hispanic, etc, descent are all American citizens currently being hurt by the H1-B program.
Couple of major issues with the current H1-B program:
First, it absolutely must cost more to bring in an immigrant to do a job than to hire an American. Under no situation should it be allowed to depress wages. If a citizen costs X, it should cost like 1.5x or some value like that to import the talent you need if you genuinely can't find the talent you need domestically.
Second, the visa should belong the the person being brought to the US. A company can sponsor them and maybe get exclusive access for some short period of time like the first year or so, but after that, the person should not have their visa tied to the employer that sponsored them. If they get a good perf review after their first year on the job, they absolutely should get an extension to stay another N years like 3 to 5, but at this point they are totally free to work for any other company with zero risk of losing their visa status if they choose not to continue working for the employer that sponsored them. If that employer wants to keep them, they'll have to pay the premium to keep them and treat them well. No immigrant should ever feel like an indentured servant.
Third, scrutiny should be applied to all companies involved in using the H1-B program as a visa mill and to co-ethnic nepotism.
You absolutely need to make sure that companies aren't "selling" the visas. For example, someone in country X should not be able to pay or perform a favor for a company in the US to get a visa. A genuine need needs to be demonstrated and we need to make sure there is no quid pro quo.
Co-ethnic nepotism is another big one. Executives and managers should not be able to sponsor H1-Bs from their country of origin or from their religious group. If the CEO of a company is from country X and manager of the team is from country Y, then the H1-B visa cannot be filled by someone from either country X or Y. There are 195 countries in the world. Removing the United States, country X and country Y, still leaves 192 other countries from which to find talent.
Lastly, we need to focus on assimilation. I have citizenship from three countries myself and I choose to live in the US because I value US culture (or at least what it was 10 to 15 years ago).
If I wanted to live and work in the other countries in which I could legally work, I'd move to those countries. I don't want that. I want to live and work in the US because I value US culture. If you disproportionately bring in immigrants from particular countries, you turn the US into those other countries for better and for worse. This happens both at the national level and at the local level. I don't want it at either.
In fact, when you disproportionately bring in people from country X into a specific locality, you make it harder for those folks to assimilate. This allows the formation of ethnic/cultural enclaves. This should not happen. You should have a mix of folks from multiple countries in a place so they actually co-mingle and assimilate to become Americans. Not hyphenated Americans, but bonafide Americans that adopt America as the home and the country in which they pride themselves.
Completely disregarding assimilation is going to kill the Golden Goose that Elon Musk values. He can build SpaceX here in American but not in country X or country Y. However, if we culturally turn the US into country X or country Y or just kill the current culture we have now with an indiscriminate immigration policy, then he won't be able to keep building SpaceX in the US in the way he has in the past. He may be able to fix the regulatory hurdles to getting to Mars with DOGE, but he won't be able to fix the culture of the country if we don't prevent the negative aspects of the change in culture. America today is already a much lower trust culture than when I moved here 29 years ago and the continued loss of trust threatens being able to get anything done together as Americans. Coethnic nepotism within a firm, for example, absolutely hurts the ability for that firm to fulfill on its mission as different enclaves within the firm fight with one another for a bigger piece of the pie instead of working together to grow the size of the pie.
America isn't just an idea and it isn't just an economic zone. It is a nation of people and the makeup of those people can evolve over time, but it should remain a nation of people.
Basically, I want to Make American a High Trust Culture Again. This has nothing to do with race or ethnicity. It's culture and it requires assimilation and a common identity.
Our motto is e pluribus unum, not e pluribus pluribus.