There is still a lot of bad blood and hard feelings between many people in the MAGA movement who have never fought with each other before over anything. Some very tough things were said that simply can’t be undone or shrugged off by some. And most of the resentment and mistrust that lingers on is directed at Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy.
I heard a new name today from one of them: Vivek Ramaswampy.
Elon and Vivek are newish passengers on the Trump Train, but right now they seem to be driving it while Trump plays golf and hosts parties at Mar-a-Lago. They made the argument that we should dramatically increase the number of H-1B visas to foreign workers in the tech industry because there weren’t enough smart, hardworking Americans to take those jobs.
When Trump finally chimed in on Day 3, he said that he has many people working at his properties on H1B visas and said they are great employees: “I always liked the visas, I have always been in favor of the visas. That’s why we had them. I’ve been a believer in H-1B. I have used it many times. It’s a great program.”
Except he forcefully denounced the H-1B program in 2016. Said it was a “scam.” And his Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller said they would never increase the H-1B numbers. But Miller and OG MAGA didn’t realize that Trump made this deal with Musk months ago. Now they are finding out.
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MAGA reaction was mixed. Some were begrudging realists, saying that Trump is siding with Musk because of the amount of money Musk put in to help him with the election so he owes Musk. Others correctly pointed out that Trump has H-1B visas mixed up with H-2B visas for temporary workers, which is what his employees came into the country on while they were working for him.
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Musk is trying to justify increasing the number of these visas by claiming they are all super geniuses and indispensable to the American economy, while mass deporting everyone else, and Trump is saying they are cleaning rooms and cutting grass at his resorts. Musk and Vivek were specifically talking about tech engineers though, not foreign workers in any other fields or vocations.
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Musk claimed that the reason why “critical people” like himself are in this country running successful businesses in the first place is because of H-1B visas. Except Musk was never here on an H-1B, and he violated the student visa he was here on when he promptly dropped out of school and started working without an H-1B.
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He then made the following post late Friday night that poured gasoline on the fire and made things much worse with this little missive to MAGA: “Take a big step back and FUCK YOURSELF in the face. I will go to war on this issue the likes of which you cannot possibly comprehend.”
Trump issued his statement to the Post agreeing with Musk several hours later. Awkward.
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But this Musk post calling his MAGA critics racist is the one that really set them off: “These contemptible fools must be removed from the Republican Party, root and stem.” They went absolutely nuts on that one, outraged that Musk would say that there are racist people in MAGA. Shocking!
So Musk then came back and tried to clarify, but only made it worse: “The ‘contemptible fools’ I’m referring to are those in the Republican Party who are hateful, unrepentant racists. They will absolutely be the downfall of the Republican Party if they are not removed.”
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Steve Bannon dedicated his entire show for 3 straight days hammering Musk with one guest after another: “You’re calling the MAGA movement racist? How dare you. Now you want to play the racism card? You think we’re going to tolerate that? We’re not. And I don’t care how big a check you wrote … You can’t stop us—we’re relentless, and we’re never going to quit. We’re a 1000 times tougher than you, and if you don’t get that, keep it up.”
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This went on for hours and hours, day after day.
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Former Trump speechwriter and Revolver News reporter Darren Beattie on Bannon’s show: “Companies profit from H1B workers, who are effectively indentured servants hoping for green cards, while taxpayers foot the bill. This privatized profit, socialized cost model isn’t a natural market system. Even economically, H1B is a scam. H1B, which shifts its costs onto taxpayers, should be on the DOGE chopping block—not something for DOGE to promote.”
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White nationalist groyper leader Nick Fuentes, who had dinner with Trump at MAL two years ago: “Elon told Trump’s base to ‘go fuck themselves in the face’ for opposing cheap foreign labor, and MAGA influencers are trying to spin that into a win. It’s disgusting and you should never forget this episode.”
Meidas Touch
