THE WHEELS MAY NOT BE COMING OFF THE MAGA BUS, BUT THEY'RE LOOSENING

Hi, I'm back. Thank you, Yas, for bringing enlightenment while I was away, as well as some actual optimism.

I hope Yas was right on Monday when he told us that in Donald Trump's incoming administration "there may be too many chaos monkeys for a properly constituted dictatorship." In response to the pre-Christmas battle over the continuing budget resolution in Congress, in which Elon Musk upended a deal in progress that appeared to be acceptable to Trump until Trump felt compelled to denounce it, Yas wrote, "I'm sure Trump and Musk hate each other." But in the current MAGA infighting over H-1B visas for high-skilled foreign workers, which Musk enthusiastically supporters and MAGA purists despise, Trump once again seems to be siding with Musk, even though the immigration program Musk has been defending isn't one Trump uses much:

“I have many H-1B visas on my properties,” he told The New York Post. “I’ve been a believer in H-1B. I have used it many times. It’s a great program.”

But his comments ... may muddy the waters because Mr. Trump appears to have only sparingly used the H-1B visa program, which allows skilled workers like software engineers to work in the United States for up to three years and can be extended to six years.

Instead, he has been a frequent and longtime user of the similarly named, but starkly different, H-2B visa program, which is for unskilled workers like gardeners and housekeepers, as well as the H-2A program, which is for agricultural workers.

Wait -- Trump employs agricultural workers? Um ... okay. In any case, he appears to use the H-1B program, but sparingly.

They’re primarily H2B and J1

— Ashley St. Clair (@stclairashley) December 28, 2024

Trump's base will feel betrayed, won't they? Well, I hope so, but I don't think it will be that simple. Trump's use of immigrant labor was widely reported during the 2016 campaign and during his first presidential term. Here's a Time story from August 2016 ("What Donald Trump Knew About Undocumented Workers at His Signature Tower"). Here's a 2018 New York Times story about undocumented workers at Trump resorts ("Making President Trump’s Bed: A Housekeeper Without Papers"). Here's a 2019 Washington Post story ("‘If You’re a Good Worker, Papers Don’t Matter’: How a Trump Construction Crew Has Relied on Immigrants Without Legal Status").

It's possible that most Trump superfans don't know about these stories, but if they do, I'm sure their response is like Rob Corddry's famous remark about Abu Ghraib on The Daily Show in 2004:

Remember: Just because torturing prisoners is something we did doesn't mean it's something we would do.

Just because hiring undocuments immigrants is something Trump did doesn't mean it's something he would do. (Trump's fans will either dismiss the stories that way or insist that Trump simply had no choice -- he had to do it because his "globalist" competitors were doing it.)

I say this even though most of Trump's fans really don't want any immigrants taking any jobs in the U.S., even if hiring immigrant workers helps the economy and creates more jobs for the native born. If we want to know how the base feels, we could be like the Times and send a reporter to an Ohio diner, or do a Trumpist focus group, but I'd rather just look at some of the top comments in response to this Gateway Pundit post -- the commenters are saying the quiet part at maximum volume:

It is absolutely about race. We are currently in a race war, and most whites don’t even realize it. If whites continue to bury their heads in the sand and pretend that we can give away our lands and resources, whites will cease to exist. Protect what is yours or perish. Be racist or go extinct.

****

Since only white nations are taking in tens of millions of migrants yes it is about race, and the fact we are called racist for noticing makes it even more about race; only whites are ever called racist, and we are fed up.

****

The line is drawn: This is nothing less than wanting to bring about the downfall of the European-American population for the sake of profit. And if White Americans say no more to our civilization being sought to be uprooted and overthrown, you're called names with the end goal being to browbeat you and keep you hushed up — however the days of abiding by this are behind us.

Only by way of the European-American population taking an unwavering stand for our blood and ancestry, our birthright, and our freedoms brought forth by our forebearers, foremost and above all else, is our only path to thrive.

But these people will stick with Trump, at least for the time being, because they have nowhere else to go. Also, he'll give them immigrant roundups starting on Day One (although he'll exempt immigrants employed by his cronies and by anyone who writes him a fat check). Footage of those immigrant raids will play endlessly on Fox News. There'll be highly publicized new raids every so often. The MAGA base will be mollified.

But Yas is right about the chaos monkeys. It's not just Musk -- it's also the deep-pocketed Christian nationalists who want to ban abortion altogether (something Trump knows will turn Americans against him) and the old-school Kochites in the GOP who want to eviscerate Social Security and Medicare (another plan that will turn the public against Trump, who really, really wants to be loved).

In theory, Trump could prevent them from creating chaos by making clear what he stands for, and also what he won't tolerate even from his inner circle. But he'd rather golf and DJ at Mar-a-Lago than do any actual work, and he'd need to understand the particular interests of the people in his coalition, which would require a tiring amount of brainwork. Trump will never learn what he needs to know when he thinks he can skate by without learning anything. That's why Musk keeps surprising him.

Eventually it will be clear to Trump's supporters that they're not going to get lower prices out of Trump and they're not going to get the removal of every immigrant and non-Christian in America. Trump will attack immigrants, the media, and trans people, but disillusionment really might set in after a couple of years, when blaming Joe Biden for every American problems will start to get tired.

But the base will need somewhere to go. They won't moderate -- they'll want someone who shares their hard line, and who promises them the prosperity Trump won't be able to deliver.

I'm not sure who can be the next charlatan to gull them. Maybe it'll be Steve Bannon, who has a high-rated podcast and who's maintaining a hard line on H-1Bs and immigration. Steve Bannon/Laura Loomer 2028?