At House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s (R-CA) annual donor summit in Jackson, Wyoming, billionaire Elon Musk told House Republicans they should be “more compassionate” on immigration as Americans suffer through the worst inflation and mass immigration costs in decades.
According to Axios, Musk attended the donor summit as “a personal guest” of McCarthy’s. When asked by a donor what Republicans could do to capture more voters, Musk reportedly suggested that the party become “more compassionate” on the issue of immigration.
Axios reports:
While Musk has been publicly flirting with the Republican Party all year, his attendance at an exclusive GOP retreat in Wyoming marks a new level of involvement in helping the party define its agenda and prepare for its potential takeover of the House. [Emphasis added]
…
Asked by a donor what the Republican Party needed to do better, the South-African-born Musk replied that it should be more compassionate to potential newcomers, noting that he chose America because of its opportunities. Immigrants, he said, are vital to maintaining a dynamic economy. [Emphasis added]
The suggestion by Musk, the CEO of Tesla, which produces electric vehicles ranging in price from $45,000 to over $200,000, is well outside the Republican Party’s base of working- and middle-class Americans who overwhelmingly support reductions to legal immigration levels as well as a rigorous agenda to end illegal immigration.
Republican likely voters in the latest Rasmussen Reports survey said by a 64 percent majority that they want to see legal immigration levels — where more than a million green cards are awarded every year — cut down to 750,000 or fewer annual admissions. A majority of those, 51 percent, said they want to see legal immigration levels reduced to fewer than 500,000 annual admissions.
Likewise, 74 percent of Republican likely voters said they want to see the process known as “chain migration,” where newly naturalized citizens can bring an unlimited number of foreign relatives to the United States, entirely eliminated.
On illegal immigration, as President Joe Biden has carried out an expansive Catch and Release operation that has freed well over a million border crossers and illegal aliens into American communities, American adults are increasingly dissatisfied with the administration’s open borders approach.
A new NPR/Ipsos Poll reveals that about 54 percent of Americans believe that the U.S. is experiencing “an invasion” at the U.S.-Mexico border under the Biden administration. Similarly, general support for immigration has crashed, as just 56 percent now say “immigrants are an important part of our American identity” compared to 75 percent who said this in January 2018.
In a recent YouGov poll, when Americans were asked “… [W]hat do you think [American companies] should do” when they are struggling to find workers, just 22 percent said import foreign workers while 50 percent said employers should raise wages to hire unemployed Americans.
Musk’s comments also come as American citizens — and especially the GOP’s base of working-class voters — are suffering through the worst inflationary pressures in decades coupled with the growing cost of mass immigration to the United States.
Despite campaigning mostly on inflation and everyday costs, House and Senate Republicans have so far failed to tie the two issues together ahead of the November midterm elections.
Much like inflation, as Breitbart News has chronicled, mass immigration serves as a transfer of wealth from working- and middle-class Americans in the nation’s heartland to wealthy residents living along the coasts.
When wages are slashed for working- and middle-class Americans forced to compete against a growing number of foreign workers for U.S. jobs, Wall Street investors, real estate developers, and giant corporations rake in billions from saved labor costs, more consumers, and more housing that must be built to shelter new arrivals.
John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Email him at jbinder@breitbart.com. Follow him on Twitter here.