Former US President Donald Trump, who is seeking to return to the top post in this year’s elections, has softened his stance on immigration and put forward a new proposal which will benefit Indian and other foreign students.
The Republican leader, known for his harsh comments against immigrants, has promised that if elected, foreign students graduating from US colleges will automatically get green cards, which allow them permanent residence in the US.
Trump said that these students become billionaires after graduating from American colleges when they return to their countries like India and China. They tried to do the same in America.
The US presidential elections in November are expected to see another edition of President Joe Biden versus Donald Trump, with immigration and deportation of illegal immigrants being one of the key issues for voters.
Trump had described illegal immigrants as “animals, not humans” during his election campaign earlier this year. However, he said in a recent podcast that he has always supported a merit-based legal immigration system.
He said on the “All-In” podcast that he plans to automatically grant green cards to students graduating from U.S. colleges as part of their diploma, allowing them to continue their stay in the country.
The podcast is hosted by Chamath Palihapitiya, Jason Calacanis, David Sacks, and David Friedberg — all of whom are venture capitalists, three of whom are immigrants.
Speaking on the podcast, Trump recalled “stories where people graduate from a top college or colleges, and they want to stay here, they have a plan for a company, a concept, and they can’t do it — they go back to India, they go back to China, they do the same basic company in those places … and they become multi-billionaires, employing thousands of people, and it could have been done here.”
The Green Card is an identity document for permanent residence in the United States.
The former president further lamented that “we’re losing people from Harvard, MIT and the greatest schools.”
He also reiterated his first term’s policy of granting green cards to foreign students after obtaining higher education degrees in STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) fields.
“Anybody who graduates from college, you go there for two years or four years, if you graduate or you get a doctorate degree from college, you should be able to stay in this country,” Trump said.
“We put a lot of pressure on talented people, people who graduate from college, people who are first in their class from the best colleges, you have to be able to recruit and retain these people,” the former president stressed.
He said some graduates who top the class don’t even strike a deal with a company because they don’t think they will be able to stay in the country, but that “is going to come to an end one day”.
Trump’s recent comments stand in contrast to his administration’s immigration policies when he was in power, which included restrictions on green cards and visas.
By the academic year 2022-23, there will be over one million foreign students studying at US colleges, and this figure is only expected to rise.