The recent appointment of Chennai-born Sriram Krishnan as the senior policy advisor for Artificial Intelligence in the Trump administration has drawn the ire of several right-wing activists, reigniting a debate over skilled immigration. 

Earlier in November, Mr. Krishnan had tweeted the need to remove country caps for green card, which is limiting the influx of skilled techies from India. Currently, there is a 7% cap per country for green card, which creates a large backlog. 

Elon Musk, who is leading Trump’s new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has come out in support of Mr. Krishnan on the need to loosen the country cap for skilled immigration, calling the policy “racist.” 

“The “fixed pie” fallacy is at the heart of much wrong-headed economic thinking. There is essentially infinite potential for job and company creation. Think of all the things that didn’t exist 20 or 30 years ago,” he tweeted. 

The sentiment was echoed in tech circles with several others voicing support. 

“The most important technical concept in AI in recent years was introduced by group comprised mostly of immigrants. The most important technology in the 21st century is largely coming out of the US today is due to immigration. America should not take this for granted,” tweeted Aaron Levie, co-founder and CEO of cloud storage firm, Box. 

Mr. Krishnan’s appointment and the dialogue around skilled immigration has split Trump’s MAGA and tech supporters. 

“The right-wing civil war is going to be over Indians. The populists hate all immigration,” tweeted right-wing political commentator, Richard Hanania.

Another right-wing political researcher, Josiah Lippincott spoke against the possible change in policies tweeting, “The flood of Indian H-1B visas that Silicon Valley will import over the next five years will do to the White middle class what Mexican migration and outsourcing did to White working class Americans.”

The way to bring these two factions together, said the co-founder of Quora and OpenAI board member, Adam D’Angelo was to “frame this as ‘how we get the best people on our team so we can win’ instead of “look how racist/selfish these people are to not want to allow it.”