West Palm seashore, Florida: President-elect donald trump on saturday sided with key supporter and billionaire tech CEO Elon Musk in a public dispute over the usage of the H-1B visa, saying he fully backs the program for overseas tech people opposed by some of his supporters.

Trump's comments observed a chain of social media posts from Musk, the CEO of tesla and SpaceX, who vowed overdue friday to go to "conflict" to defend the visa application for foreign tech employees.

trump, who moved to limit the visas' use all through his first presidency, advised The new york submit on saturday he turned into likewise in favor of the visa program.

"i have many H-1B visas on my houses. i have been a believer in H-1B. i have used it many times. it's a high-quality program," he became quoted as pronouncing.

Musk, a naturalized U.S. citizen born in South Africa, has held an H-1B visa, and his electric-car employer tesla acquired 724 of the visas this 12 months. H-1B visas are generally for 3-year intervals, though holders can make bigger them or follow for inexperienced cards.

The altercation changed into activate earlier this week by far-proper activists who criticized Trump's choice of sriram Krishnan, an indian American project capitalist, to be an adviser on artificial intelligence, saying he would have have an effect on at the trump management's immigration guidelines.

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Musk's tweet changed into directed at Trump's supporters and immigration tough-liners who have more and more pushed for the H-1B visa program to be scrapped amid a heated debate over immigration and the area of skilled immigrants and overseas employees delivered into the united states of america on work visas.

On friday, Steve Bannon, a longtime trump confidante, critiqued "huge tech oligarchs" for assisting the H-1B program and solid immigration as a hazard to Western civilization.

In reaction, Musk and many other tech billionaires drew a line among what they view as prison immigration and illegal immigration.

trump has promised to deport all immigrants who are inside the U.S. illegally, installation price lists to help create more jobs for American citizens and severely restriction immigration.

The visa problem highlights how tech leaders like Musk -- who has taken an crucial function inside the presidential transition, advising on key personnel and coverage regions -- are now drawing scrutiny from his base.

The U.S. tech industry is based at the government's H-1B visa software to lease overseas professional employees to help run its groups, a exertions force that critics say undercuts wages for American residents.

Musk has spent extra than a quarter of a billion dollars assisting trump get elected in November. He has published regularly this week about the dearth of homegrown expertise to fill all of the wanted positions within American tech organizations.


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