On Monday’s broadcast of Newsmax TV’s “Wake Up America,” Chad Wolf, who served as acting Homeland Security Secretary during the Trump administration, said that while there are problems with the H-1B visa program, the United States also makes it difficult for foreign students who come to the United States to get an education to stay here and “we should be encouraging” them to stay in the U.S. and do so “based on merit, not on a lottery system, not on which country are you from, but from merit.”
Co-host Marc Lotter said, “One of the things that it’s been also focused on is that the President, I think, and Elon, Vivek, have all said, if you are a foreign student, you want to come here and you want to study in America at some of our most prestigious institutions, then you should stay here, apply your learning, that we helped support, in an American company, rather than taking it back to India or even a potential adversary in China. And I think that’s some of the reform that people are talking about.”
Wolf responded, “Yeah, I think that’s part of it. Look, a lot of these students that come here, they get educated here would like to stay here and start businesses. And I think that’s a good thing for the U.S. economy. And we make it difficult and we make it very hard for them to do that. And so, they often, as you indicated, will go back to their home country and start new businesses there and start their entrepreneur business. And we want to make sure that we retain that best and that brightest here in the United States. So, allowing them to finish their studies and get that high degree, that advanced degree, in many instances and stay here in the United States, we should be encouraging that. Again, we should be doing this based on merit, not on a lottery system, not on which country are you from, but from merit. And I think if we do that, we’ll be in a good place.”
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
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