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THE MAGA HONEYMOON IS OVER  
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Ali Breland
December 30, 2024
The Atlantic
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_ Silicon Valley and the nativist right worked together to elect
Trump. Now the infighting has begun. _

, Photo Illustration by The Daily Beast/Reuters

 

Elon Musk spent Christmas Day online, in the thick of a particularly
venomous culture war, one that would lead him to later make the
un-Christmas-like demand of his critics to “take a big step back and
FUCK YOURSELF in the face.”

Donald Trump had ignited this war by appointing the venture capitalist
Sriram Krishnan to be his senior AI-policy adviser. Encouraged by the
MAGA acolyte and expert troll Laura Loomer
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parts of the far-right internet melted down, arguing that Krishnan’s
appointment symbolized a betrayal of the principles of the “America
First” movement.

Krishnan is an Indian immigrant and a U.S. citizen who, by virtue of
his heritage, became a totem for the MAGA right to argue about H-1B
visas, which allow certain skilled immigrants to work in the United
States. (Many tech companies
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on this labor.) In response to Krishnan’s appointment, some
right-wing posters used racist memes
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smear Indians, who have made up nearly-three quarters of H-1B
recipients in recent years. Loomer called
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“third world invaders” and invoked
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Replacement” theory, which claims that America’s white population
is being purposefully replaced by nonwhite people from other
countries.

Although Musk has seemingly embraced white supremacy
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the platform he owns, X, he apparently could not stand for an attack
on a government program that has helped make him money. He is himself
an immigrant from South Africa who has said
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the U.S. under an H-1B visa before becoming a citizen. Musk also
employs such workers at his companies. He posted on X in support of
the H-1B program, arguing
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elite talent to America. This perspective is not remotely
controversial for the Silicon Valley set, but the reactionary and
nationalist wings of the Republican Party got very upset with Musk,
very quickly. “The American people don’t view America as a sports
team or a company,” the provocateur Jack Posobiec wrote
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to one of Musk’s tweets on Thursday. “They view it as their
home.” Later, Musk warned
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that he will “go to war on this issue the likes of which you cannot
possibly comprehend.” By the weekend, Steve Bannon, Trump’s former
adviser, had called
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a “scam” and said that Musk’s defense of highly skilled
immigrants is showing his “true colors.”

The tech right and nationalist right are separate (but overlapping)
factions that operated in tandem to help get Trump reelected. Now they
are at odds. For possibly the first time since Trump’s victory, the
racial animus and nativism that galvanized the nationalist right
cannot immediately be reconciled with the tech right’s desire to
effectively conquer the world (and cosmos, in Musk’s case) using any
possible advantage. After winning the election together, one side was
going to have to lose.

It should be said that opposing H-1Bs is not an inherently MAGA
position. The program has well-documented flaws
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and has received bipartisan criticism. For instance, Senator Bernie
Sanders, an independent, has previously argued
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highly skilled immigrant labor is a potential weapon that business
owners can use to lower wages. Similarly, supporting H-1Bs says only
so much about someone’s politics. Although Musk casts his defense of
highly skilled immigrants as racially inclusive, he has
repeatedly flirted
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prejudice
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X and has vocally supported
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German far-right party with ties to neo-Nazis.

In any case, the coalition of the tech right and the nationalist right
was bound to be tested. The two are similar in certain ways: They
share a reactionary, anti-“woke” commitment to reversing a
perceived pattern of American weakness brought about by DEI
initiatives, and both have exhibited authoritarian tendencies
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But there were always fissures. The tech right’s desire for free
markets is in fundamental tension with a rising conservative
skepticism of unchecked capitalism; Tucker Carlson, for example, has
spoken critically of “market capitalism,” arguing that
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that weakens and destroys families isn’t worth having.” Much of
the nationalist far right sees itself as a movement that values the
flourishing, vitality, and self-determination of human beings (as long
as they are of the correct race or nationality). Meanwhile, much of
the tech right is concerned with advancing technology above all
else—the most extreme wings don’t even mind if that ultimately
results in human extinction
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For a little while, it almost seemed like the right could dodge these
conflicts. Vice President–Elect J. D. Vance is the physical
embodiment of a compromise between the far-right, aggressively
reactionary, nationalist wing of the Republican Party and its
tech-evangelist faction. He worked in a venture-capital firm
co-founded by Peter Thiel, the right-wing tech billionaire;
has criticized
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free markets; and has been cheered on
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far-right influencers with big followings. He has spoken out against
H-1B visas
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as he invested in companies that applied to use them. But part of
Vance’s job is to unite his party against a common enemy; that role
became less urgent after Election Day.

This skirmish is a preview of how tension between the tech right and
the nationalist right may play out once Trump takes office. The
nationalists will likely get most of what they want—Trump has
already promised mass deportations, to their delight—but when they
butt heads with Silicon Valley, Trump will likely defer
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his wealthiest friends. That’s how things went during his first
term. Despite Trump’s populist promise in 2016 that he would create
an economy that benefited common people at the expense of large
corporations and the rich (a position popular with the more
nationalist wing of the right), he largely did the opposite,
supporting and signing into law tax cuts for corporations and the
wealthy. This happened even as much of the tech world rebuked Trump
over his “Muslim ban
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and family-separation policy, which employees of tech giants prodded
their leaders to oppose.

This time around, with Musk and the tech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy
running the newly created Department of Government Efficiency, the
billionaire venture capitalist Marc Andreessen helping staff the
department
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and Krishnan set to advise on AI policy, the tech right is being
integrated into the incoming administration. Trump’s other
appointments also suggest that his administration will be friendly to
the rich and powerful. His advisers and Cabinet appointments so far
consist of
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confidants from finance and real estate—industries that prioritize
markets above other conservative principles. His proposed Cabinet
includes few who would be considered dedicated members of the
nationalist right. No surprise, then, that Trump seemed to side with
Musk, telling
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York Post_ on Saturday, “I’ve always liked the visas, I have
always been in favor of the visas. That’s why we have them.”
Perhaps even more so than last time, the plutocrats are in control.

_Ali Breland is a staff writer at The Atlantic. _

* MAGA
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* Silicon Valley
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* Conflicts of Interest
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