In what is seen as a U-turn, US President Donald Trump appeared to defend the H-1B visa programme to bring talent from across the world, saying a foreign investor cannot pull people off an unemployment line, who haven’t worked in five years, and start making missiles.
“I agree but you also do have to bring in talent,” Trump said, responding to a question in an interview with Laura Ingraham on Fox News on whether the H-1B visa issue will not be a big priority for his administration and if one wants to raise wages for American workers as the country cannot be flooded with hundreds of thousands of foreign workers.
When Ingraham noted that “we have plenty of talent”, Trump said, “No, you don’t, no, you don’t. You don’t have certain talents. And people have to learn.” “You can’t take people off an unemployment line, and say, ‘I’m going to put you into a factory, we’re going to make missiles’,” Trump added.
“In Georgia, they raided because they wanted illegal immigrants. They had people from South Korea that made batteries all their lives. You know, making batteries (is) very complicated. It’s not an easy thing, and very dangerous. A lot of explosions, lot of problems,” he said.
