I’m Isaac Saul, and this is Tangle: an independent, nonpartisan, subscriber-supported politics newsletter that summarizes the best arguments from across the political spectrum on the news of the day — then “my take.”
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Today's read: 14 minutes.
Exploring rising rates of autism.
One of the most discussed trends in our country right now is the rising rate of autism. Over break, Tangle Managing Editor Ari Weitzman interviewed Jill Escher about it. Escher is an autism research advocate and the mother of two non-verbal autistic children, and she shared her ideas on what’s driving the increase, areas for further research, and how we can better understand the issues. You can listen to a free preview of the episode here or the full, members-only version here.
Quick hits.
- In Louisiana, the U.S. recorded the first person to die with bird flu. State officials say they have not identified any other cases in the state, and health officials maintain there is no evidence of person-to-person spread anywhere in the country. (The death)
- Congress certified President-elect Donald Trump’s victory. No objections to any state’s results were raised. (The certification)
- Meta announced that it will replace its fact-checking program with a community-driven approach similar to X’s Community Notes. CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the change is intended to prioritize free speech on Meta’s platforms. (The announcement)
- President Joe Biden announced an executive action banning new oil and gas leasing across 625 million acres of U.S. ocean. President-elect Trump said he plans to reverse the action when he takes office. (The action)
- The South Korean military detected what it believes to be a medium-range ballistic missile test-launched by North Korea toward the Sea of Japan. The launch coincided with Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s arrival in South Korea. (The launch)
Today's topic.
The H-1B visa debate. In recent weeks, the H-1B visa program has prompted vigorous discussion about the U.S. immigration system, foreign workers, and the tech industry. The debate has proved divisive among supporters of President-elect Donald Trump and has sparked disagreement on the left. Most notably, tech entrepreneurs like Elon Musk voiced strong support for H-1B visas to help them access skilled international talent, while proponents of restrictionist immigration policies and progressives like Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) argued that the incoming Trump administration should scale back or eliminate the program.
Back up: The H-1B visa program enables U.S. companies to temporarily hire skilled foreign workers — typically in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) fields — with added stipulations meant to protect U.S. workers from being adversely affected, such as requiring employers to pay H-1B workers equal or greater wages as nonimmigrants in comparable roles. Visa applicants must have the equivalent education of a bachelor’s degree, and workers can stay in the country for up to six years while employed on the H-1B visa.
H-1B visas were established by the 1990 Immigration Act, but the program also has roots in the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act, which created immigration criteria that considered employment and work skills. The government issues 85,000 new H-1B visas per year, with specific caps for different countries and regions, and awards visas to applicants through a lottery system. In recent decades, major companies like Amazon, IBM, Meta and Microsoft have hired significant numbers of foreign workers through the program, often submitting hundreds of thousands of petitions for the visas each year.
The recent debate began when Laura Loomer, a conservative activist and outspoken Trump supporter, criticized the president-elect’s selection of Indian-American venture capitalist Sriram Krishnan as an adviser on artificial intelligence policy, suggesting that Krishnan would advocate for lax immigration policies related to hiring foreign workers. Prominent tech entrepreneurs, including Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, rebuked the comments, arguing that the U.S. should recruit and welcome skilled foreign workers while criticizing the work culture among many American candidates. The comments sparked significant debate over the merits of hiring foreign workers instead of Americans, the U.S. tech industry’s reliance on the H-1B program, work culture in America, and the value of restrictionist immigration policy.
During his 2016 presidential campaign, Trump came out against H-1B visas but has since expressed support for the program, recently saying that he is “a believer in H-1B.” Meanwhile, Musk has softened his initial stance, posting on X that it is “very clear that the program is broken and needs major reform” and proposing several changes.
While many Democrats affirmed their support for the program during the debate, some progressive lawmakers criticized it. On Thursday, Sen. Bernie Sanders argued H-1B visas are a mechanism for U.S. companies to “replace good-paying American jobs with low-wage indentured servants from abroad.” Elsewhere, lawmakers from both parties have backed bipartisan reforms to the program to address potential abuses.
Today, we’ll dive into the debate over H-1B visas, with views from the left and right. Then, my take.
What the left is saying.
- The left largely supports the program, but many support moderate reforms.
- Some view the current system as a tool to undermine American workers.
- Others suggest that changes to the program’s administration could address concerns from both sides.
The Boston Globe editorial board said “Trump gets it right on skilled worker visas.”
“MAGA hardliners may be apoplectic, but President-elect Donald Trump got it spot on when he embraced the kind of visa program used to bring highly skilled technology workers to this country — an article of faith for the ‘tech bros’ who supported Trump during his campaign,” the board wrote. “Expanding the program, which is currently capped at a piddling 85,000 (65,000 plus another 20,000 reserved for those who graduate from US universities with a master’s degree or higher), is critical to the kind of economic growth and competitiveness that Trump supported all through his campaign.”
“If Musk and his codirector on Trump’s effort to cut government waste, Vivek Ramaswamy, do nothing beyond convincing the incoming administration to cut that red tape, reach out beyond this nation’s borders, and invite in those with the talent and the drive to help build this nation, they will have done a great service,” the board said. “There is also nothing contradictory about supporting a well-organized visa program that helps deliver the workforce America needs and still provides the secure border which Trump has also promised to deliver.”
In The American Prospect, Ryan Cooper wrote “President Musk declares war on American workers.”
“Oligarchs like Musk and David Sacks say that the H-1B program is vital because Americans are too stupid and lazy to learn technical skills. This is not remotely true—on the contrary, there is currently a sizable surplus of technical labor, as the generation that had ‘learn to code’ as the automatic route to a six-figure salary beaten into them graduates, while the tech industry conducts mass layoffs,” Cooper said. “The real reason the capitalist class loves H-1B is as a weapon of class warfare. First, it provides a pool of highly exploitable labor who have to obey the boss’s every command or risk deportation.
“Second, that pool provides leverage against domestic workers who have to compete against exploited H-1Bs… In short, the MAGA faithful are not entirely incorrect to say H-1B harms the American working class,” Cooper wrote. However, “the solution is not to deport all those visa holders, but to fold the program into a streamlined general employment-based visa program (which leads to permanent residency) and give them all green cards so they are not so exploitable. Alas, that kind of sensible immigration reform is not going to happen with Trump as president.”
In The Washington Post, Rishi Sharma and Chad Sparber shared a “solution to Trump World’s ‘civil war’ over H-1B visas.”
“Current law limits the number of new H-1B workers to 85,000 per year. Demand for these visas far exceeds supply. For fiscal 2025, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) received more than 470,000 petitions. So applicants have a roughly 1 in 5 chance of winning the right to work in the United States,” Sharma and Sparber said. “As any lottery player knows, the more tickets you buy, the greater your chances of winning. Since firms petition for H-1B status on behalf of specific prospective employees, they search for — and extend job offers to — a large number of individuals who will never get a visa.”
“What’s the remedy? Replace the lottery with an auction… The United States can move in this direction by allowing firms to select, bid for and pay for the workers they most desire. The government could then earmark this revenue for training American workers in STEM skills — thus using the H-1B program as a vehicle to invest in American workers,” Sharma and Sparber wrote. “This auction idea is not a new one. What is new is academic evidence that such a policy would be cost-neutral to firms. Billions of dollars wasted on superfluous job searches would instead flow to government coffers. The role of outsourcing firms would decrease. And revenue would bolster the American STEM workforce.”
What the right is saying.
- The right is mixed on H-1B visas, with many backing President-elect Trump’s stance.
- Some say the program needs significant reforms to prioritize American workers.
- Others argue the election showed voters want less immigration of any kind.
The Wall Street Journal editorial board said “Trump is right on H-1B visas.”
“Mr. Trump is choosing the side of enlightened nationalism, as opposed to the blinkered, declinist version… Mr. Trump’s position isn’t surprising since he has often said he favors skilled immigration. In June he told a podcast with Silicon Valley potentates that if ‘anybody graduates from a college, you go in there for two years or four years, if you graduate, or you get a doctorate degree from a college, you should be able to stay in this country’... The U.S. is in a global competition for economic and technological leadership, and U.S. firms need the best talent. Studies show that when applicants are denied H-1Bs, they go abroad.”
“There have been some abuses of the H-1B program, but they are no reason to shrink or eliminate it. U.S. companies find it crucial to compete. And one way to reduce illegal immigration is to allow more legal pathways to meet the needs of the U.S. economy,” the board said. “Some conservatives want to define nationalism solely by geography and ethnicity. But the U.S. has thrived because it has invited talented newcomers from many nations who add to U.S. strength and vitality. This is intelligent nationalism of the kind we assume Mr. Trump wants.”
In Newsweek, John Mac Ghlionn argued “fixing the H-1B visa begins at home—not with more migrants.”
“America's education system is failing to produce the workforce it needs. This isn't a matter of intelligence—Indian and Chinese students aren't born smarter than Americans. Their edge lies in rigorous preparation, while U.S. schools flounder in ideological battles and declining standards,” Mac Ghlionn wrote. “Tech companies, desperate for skilled labor, have turned to H-1B visas as a crutch. The program, while valuable in theory, is often exploited in practice. Instead of reserving these visas for truly exceptional, specialized talent, many companies use them to import cheaper labor, sidelining qualified Americans in the process.
“But why should America settle for this? The talent exists within its borders; it simply needs to be nurtured. Apprenticeships offer a way out of this quagmire. Forget the bloated and ideologically fraught university system. Envision a streamlined, company-led program that trains young Americans in practical, real-world skills, without the debt and distractions of academia,” Mac Ghlionn said. “America has always thrived by attracting the best from around the world. The H-1B program, if used responsibly, can bring in hyper-specialized talent to complement a strong domestic workforce. But the foundation must be American.”
In The Federalist, B.L. Hahn wrote about “what Elon and Vivek get wrong about H-1B immigration and American exceptionalism.”
“Those with a vested interest in the current system scrambled to defend the program as the general narrative for mass migration went from ‘just doing jobs Americans won’t do’ to ‘Americans are the equivalent of lobotomized torsos who lack the mental and physical capability to do literally any job,’” Hahn said. “There’s a spectrum of beliefs on the issue, but if you distill the discussion to its core, almost everyone falls into one of two groups: 1) Chamber of Commerce, growth-at-all-costs types who see America as a ‘sports team’ or 2) those who see America as a people with a specific culture.”
“If the election didn’t make this clear, I’ll state it as plainly as possible: We want less immigration. That includes legal immigrants and H-1B workers. And please stop telling us America will always be as American as ever, regardless of how many foreigners we import,” Hahn wrote. “If there’s one decisive victory of the Trump era, it’s that we aren’t playing that game anymore, and the name-calling in response is no longer a deterrent. America has done its share of charitable immigration. We’ve welcomed people from every part of the world. It’s time to put Americans first, and that includes reforming the H-1B visa program.”
My take.
Reminder: "My take" is a section where I give myself space to share my own personal opinion. If you have feedback, criticism or compliments, don't unsubscribe. Write in by replying to this email, or leave a comment.
- As much as intraparty debates are fascinating, the policy ramifications of H-1B reform could be huge.
- I think the program offers important benefits to our country and believe Musk is right to defend it.
- How Trump includes H-1B reform in his immigration agenda is an open question, and this issue is still evolving.
These kinds of disagreements are what happens when you run a "big tent" political campaign and build a broader ideological coalition. Everyone is happy to get under one roof, but it doesn't take long for the fractures to show. For MAGA-world, I think this debate is good and healthy, and frankly not all that surprising. I don’t think it portends some major Musk-Trump-MAGA-world break up (though I do think Musk’s days in Trump’s close orbit are numbered).
What is surprising is just how many people in Trump's orbit seem to have imagined people like Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy were on their side on this issue. I will genuinely never understand how people come to believe that these rich technocrats circling Trump aren't primarily interested in advancing their own agendas; all of Musk's companies very obviously lean on foreign labor to operate, while Ramaswamy has made his views on American labor very clear.
While intraparty fighting and unfolding social dynamics are always captivating, the policy debate here is far more complicated.
Last year, we published an excellent reader essay by Yash Sharma, an Indian immigrant on an H-1B visa. Given that most H-1B workers are Indians, and Indians also make up a huge percentage of our highly skilled immigrants, the piece is more relevant now than ever.
I don't agree with all of Sharma's conclusions, but he does a great job laying out how the program works, how it "ties your life to your job" and how it leaves H-1B visa holders living in fear, unable to actually settle down in their new country. While he criticizes the hard-to-deny racist roots of some immigration rules we still operate under, Sharma also hammers the Biden administration for giving work permits to unauthorized migrants, granting people here illegally the right to stay with few restrictions while people like Sharma, who came legally, are at the whims of their employers and the timeline for renewal.
Directionally, a lot of what Sharma wrote resonates with me. Also, even though I've criticized Musk a lot recently, he’s right about this issue, too: Skilled immigrants are good for the U.S. On net, they help our economy, they create more jobs by helping companies succeed, and they start companies at a higher rate than native-born workers — some of which become household names or industry goliaths. As Musk put it in a simple but effective analogy, if you want the best team (country), you recruit the best players (some of whom will be immigrants).
In my free-market brain, I look at all this and think "these tradeoffs are worth it, even if it means some native-born workers lose out on the jobs they desire." But surprisingly, such a justification isn’t even necessary: The program is explicitly designed not to harm U.S. workers, and it seems like it’s working as intended. Little evidence exists that H-1B workers actually depress the wages of native workers or take jobs from them.
Trump also seemed to take the side of, as The Wall Street Journal put it, "enlightened nationalism." I’d love to credit him for it, but he seemingly confused the H-1B program with the H-2B program, more commonly used for hospitality and construction workers (in an interview, Trump said he was a "believer" in H-1B and has "used it many times" at his properties, which was the tell). Still, Trump and Musk both acknowledge that visas are a good way to fill a lot of jobs while also ensuring our country’s place as a destination for global talent.
And I agree; the H-1B program fits nicely within my larger framework for solving our immigration crisis: I want more border enforcement, more adjudication of asylum claims, a clearing of the backlog of people here illegally, and more incentives to come here legally. Our goal, fundamentally, should be to decrease illegal immigration and increase legal immigration — that way, as a society and government, we can do the very basic thing of deciding who gets to come and who doesn't. If one facet of that is opening the door for skilled engineers who want to bolster our tech industry and make sure we keep winning on the global stage, that is A-okay with me.
Some criticisms of the H-1B program strike me as unfair if not absurd — like comparing the program to indentured servitude. Indentured servants mortgage away their very freedom; they don’t make an average salary of $132,000, get fought over for desirable jobs, and operate freely in society. I believe most of these workers, including workers like Sharma, are critical of the program because they want more assurances that they can stay here legally — because their lives here are good. We shouldn’t lose sight of that in discussing the issue.
Yet, as Sharma and others have documented, the program does allow for some abusive practices. Even if it doesn't result in underpaid workers or isn't taking jobs from Americans wholesale, the incentive to hire H-1B workers who face deportation if you decide to fire them is obvious. That dynamic is not healthy — and there is no easy fix to that part of the program without major changes.
And there are some good reforms on the table. The lottery process is wasteful, as Rishi Sharma and Chad Sparber documented in their Washington Post piece. Firms ask for more visas than they will ever get, like someone buying rolls of raffle tickets to increase their chances of winning, and the result is a lot of wasted money, time, and applications for people who will never get a visa to come here. Sharma and Sparber suggest replacing the lottery with an auction system — encouraging companies to bid for the workers they most desire. The proposal would save the government money and time while also rewarding merit. Conservatives have argued for a similar reform, so this solution has the benefit of bipartisan common ground.
Furthermore, Trump can start his term by opening up more H-1B visas to compete with the obvious demand for labor. We can also improve our own education system (as John Mac Ghlionn argued under “What the right is saying”) so native-born Americans can keep competing in STEM fields.
The rub here, obviously, is that I don't know if this is what many of Trump's supporters want. X might make it seem like MAGA is fundamentally opposed to more H-1B holders, and certainly a sizable portion of Trump voters want less immigration of all kinds, period. But a Pew survey from September of 2024 found 71% of Trump supporters want to admit more high-skilled immigrants and 63% want to allow international students who get a college degree here to stay in the country. So Republicans are clearly trying to decide where to draw that line in real time.
H-1B and other visa programs like it should be the open, monitored door we use to let in immigrants who want to come here and contribute to society — economically, culturally, and socially. One good way to facilitate that is to improve the existing H-1B program and come a little closer to meeting the demand for it. Do I think Trump will make it a priority? That will depend a lot on who in his circle can win him over on this issue. But the division among Republicans and his supporters could certainly make for some fascinating discussion in the next four years.
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Your questions, answered.
Q: The most shocking result [of the election] for me personally was how poorly ranked choice voting did across the nation… Why do you think this was? At a time when both candidates were historically unpopular and the country incredibly divided, why aren’t people more interested in increasing their choices and trying to get out of this awful 2-party system? Is it just too complicated for people?
— Ben from Portland, OR
Tangle: Yes, it’s too complicated — and that’s not a trivial thing. When voters read up on the people they’re choosing to be our leaders, they shouldn’t have to read up on the system they use to elect those leaders. Electoral systems should be simple and intuitive.
That just hasn’t been the case with ranked-choice voting (RCV). Alameda, CA, certified the wrong winner of a school board election because the ranked-choice voting system was tabulated incorrectly. RCV elections result in a huge number of spoiled ballots. Delays in elections using RCV can sometimes last weeks. Voters sometimes feel like they have to fill out a spreadsheet to simply make their voices heard. All in all, the complexity of the system creates what critics believe to be irredeemable inequities.
We’ve written in favor of RCV in the past, so it may not come as a surprise when I say that while these issues are real, I think they’re solvable. Remember, RCV is pretty new, and we can expect a few issues when we roll out new systems. The biggest reason why RCV ballots are thrown out is that most RCV elections require voters to select their second or third choices — that doesn’t seem necessary to me. And instant runoff systems and an electorate that’s more familiar with the process can help solve delays.
While I’m still optimistic about ranked-choice voting, I’d be lying if I said that these issues weren’t real. Add in all the outside money that’s poured into local elections or ballot initiatives, and I can certainly understand why so many people said they’d had enough of ranked-choice voting in 2024. But I also think it’s important to note RCV is being attacked by partisans in parts of the country where they think it will harm their electoral odds — and that too is having a big impact.
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Under the radar.
On Friday, United States Surgeon General Vivek H. Murthy issued an advisory recommending warning labels on alcohol be updated to include cancer risks, citing burgeoning evidence of the link between alcohol consumption and cancer. Murthy said that alcohol contributes to 100,000 cancer cases and 20,000 related deaths each year, and noted that alcohol is the third-leading preventable cause of cancer in the U.S. (after tobacco and obesity). Any change to health warning labels would require Congressional approval. The Washington Post has the story.
Numbers.
- 3.871. The number of H-1B petitions approved for initial employment at Amazon, the most of any company, in fiscal year 2024, according to the National Foundation for American Policy.
- 1,264. The number of H-1B petitions approved for initial employment at Microsoft in fiscal year 2024.
- 742. The number of H-1B petitions approved for initial employment at Tesla in fiscal year 2024.
- 16.7%. The percentage of H-1B petitions approved for initial employment in California in fiscal year 2024, the largest share of any state.
- 15.3%. The percentage of H-1B petitions approved for initial employment in Texas in fiscal year 2024, the second-largest share of any state.
- 24%, 21%, and 13%. The denial rate for H-1B petitions for initial employment in fiscal years 2018, 2019, and 2020, respectively.
- 4% and 2%. The denial rate for H-1B petitions for initial employment in fiscal years 2021 and 2022, respectively.
The extras.
- One year ago today we had just released a YouTube video on misinformation on the war in Gaza.
- The most clicked link in yesterday’s newsletter were the photos of President Biden with his son Hunter’s Chinese business associates.
- Nothing to do with politics: A man refusing to sell the city back a street he bought
- Our most recent survey: 2,578 readers responded to our survey asking about threats to public safety with 40% identifying access to firearms and explosives as the biggest threat. “I think the large number of attacks on our public and private schools is a threat we need to address urgently,” one respondent said.
Have a nice day.
If Mikal Bridges didn’t play in the NBA, he would be a second grade teacher. Recently, the Brooklyn Nets player stopped by an elementary school where he dropped into classes throughout the day — first he played basketball in gym class, then played the xylophone in a music class, and then took a turn at teaching math. Throughout the day, students came to puzzle him with riddles, or ask for a hug, or tell them about their basketball skills. CBS News has the story.
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