Trump Indicates End of ‘Hire American’ Policy, May Invite More Foreign Workers

President Donald Trump suggested that he is ready to ditch his Inauguration Day promise of a “Hire American” economic policy — even though thousands of auto workers are being laid off, millions of Americans do not have jobs, and many millions of Americans cannot get better-paying jobs.

The huge policy shift in favor of employers and investors is emerging after Congress blocked his border wall and his border security reforms, and after the GOP-led Congress passed Trump’s tax cut.

“It is fair to say that the President is abandoning his Hire American policy,” said Mark Krikorian, director of the Center for Immigration Studies.

Trump’s statement also gives a green light to the panel of GOP and Democratic appropriators in Congress who are trying to overcome the partisan gridlock over the border wall and border security, Krikorian added. The legislators are expected to draft a compromise by February 15 that can expand several migration-related programs which allow employers to import cheap, temporary “visa workers” instead of hiring Americans at market rates, he said....

One of the draft visa-worker expansions is dubbed “country caps.” It would remove diversity provisions in immigration law to allow employers to offer citizenship to roughly 100,000 Indian outsourcing workers each year if they agree to cheaply replace the American graduates who are now working in well-paid software, accounting, design, engineering, medicine, and education careers. The panel is expected to draft their plan by February 15....