Vivek Ramaswamy Touts Pacific Trade Deal, Urges More Migration

GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy told Elon Musk Friday that he favors more immigration into skilled U.S. jobs and that former President Donald Trump made a “poor decision” by exiting the Pacific-region free trade treaty.

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About 20 minutes into the conversation, Ramaswamy also argued for more migration after Musk called for more migration:

I agree with that. I actually fully agree with that. And that’s one of the things where I think the Republican Party needs to define where we actually stand. There is an anti-legal immigration current [mood among voters] … I’m going to be on the debate stage in a month, and if anybody has any qualms with this, I think I’m gonna have a real problem with that because merit-based immigration is one of the fixes to economic growth in this country.

“Merit-based immigration” refers mostly to the inflow of foreign graduates into the well-paid white-collar careers needed by American graduates.

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During the lengthy conversation on Twitter Spaces, Ramaswamy backed Musk’s portrayal of United States society as a sports team where managers can freely replace lagging domestic players with more productive foreigners.

Musk, who is an immigrant from South Africa, said:

I want to say it in a way that … everyone can understand, which, imagine if America is a pro-sports team. We want to win the championship, and we want to keep winning the championship. And there are some ace players on another team, and they really want to join our team. And now we can make them fight us, or we can have them join our team and just crush [the championships]. And I think if ace players want to join our team, please do. That is the way to continue success … [We] should welcome them, not have all these ridiculous [immigration] obstacles.

“Exactly,” the U.S.-born Ramaswamy responded before blaming President Joe Biden’s business-backed flood of illegal migrants for Americans’ rising opposition to legal and illegal migration:

I think part of the reason you have that reaction is … what we have is somebody who doesn’t even sign up for the team just gets to show up on the field. And that’s what we have now, which creates a backlash from the existing team members to say, “We don’t want any more,” when in fact, what we should be saying is, “We want the best ones who come and follow the process for actually training and joining the team.” And that’s what I think merit-based legal immigration ought to be about.

Both Ramaswamy and Musk own businesses or investment firms that gain whenever the government does not protect citizens and employees against an inflow of foreign candidates for jobs needed by American citizens and their families.

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Even as he argued for more migration and loosened curbs on foreign investment, Ramaswamy called for a renaissance in U.S. society after decades of losses caused by migration and outsourcing to China:

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“I think we should definitely not lose, like, pride in America,” Musk responded. “We should be proud to be American, and I certainly am.”