Trump vows to ‘hire American.’ His businesses keep hiring foreign guest workers

By Curt Devine, CNN

(CNN) — President-elect Donald Trump vowed on the campaign trail to do everything in his power to benefit American workers. “We will build American, buy American and hire American,” he said during a rally in August.

Despite that pledge, Trump’s own businesses sought to hire more foreign guest workers this year than any other year on record, according to a CNN review of government labor data. Companies linked to some of Trump’s top political backers and administration picks also have been given the green light to use guest workers this year.

Trump’s businesses, including the Mar-a-Lago Club, some of his golf courses and a Virginia winery, have collectively increased their reliance on temporary foreign laborers over the years.

Just this year, Trump’s businesses received approval from the US government to hire 209 foreign workers, nearly double the number of such laborers his companies received permission to hire about a decade ago.

The workers include cooks, housekeepers, servers and desk clerks.

Trump has said the seasonal nature of some of his clubs necessitates some temporary jobs that Americans looking for full-time work are reluctant to take. Forbes first reported on Friday Trump’s businesses hired more foreign workers than ever in 2024.

Some former Trump club staffers who spoke to CNN on the condition of anonymity said Trump could attract more Americans to those temporary roles at his properties if his businesses raised the positions’ wages or offered other perks.

Elon Musk, who spent hundreds of millions of dollars to help elect Trump, is the CEO of Tesla, which this year alone has requested and received US government permission to hire about 2,000 highly skilled foreign workers. Musk’s Neuralink startup as well as X Corp also received approval for such laborers.

Subsidiaries of companies run by Trump’s pick for commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick, as well as another run by his pick for Social Security Administration commissioner, Frank Bisignano, have also received approval to hire foreign guest workers this year.

Most of the guest workers at Trump properties have been granted US work visas through the H-2B program, which allows employers to hire foreigners when there are not enough Americans who are able, willing, qualified, and available to do some temporary work. While thousands of US businesses use guest workers, the process of hiring them can be cumbersome.

The hiring practices at some of Trump’s businesses put them at odds with some of the incoming president’s allies who have called for the government to rollback that visa program.

Project 2025, a conservative blueprint written by dozens of former Trump administration officials, called on Congress to immediately cap the H-2B program and establish a “gradual and predictable phasedown” in coming years. That proposal appeared in a section that argued the US “must put the interests of American workers first.” Trump distanced himself from Project 2025 during the campaign but has since picked a co-author to lead the Office of Management and Budget.

Neither the Trump Organization nor the companies linked to some of Trump’s top political backers and administration picks responded to requests for comment.

‘Should these programs exist at all?’

Mark Krikorian, the executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, a think tank that supports tighter controls of immigration, said foreign guest-worker programs can benefit “businesses at the expense of workers.”

Krikorian, who supports Trump, said he doesn’t fault individual businesses such as Trump’s clubs for using the programs. However, he said those programs, particularly the H-2B visas, undermine American workers’ bargaining power in certain places and prevent companies from having to get creative in attracting domestic job applicants. He said the hospitality industry could create an American guest worker program, for example, that attracts young people from places in the US with fewer seasonal jobs to these positions by offering free airfare and lodging.

“Should these programs exist at all?” Krikorian asked. “In most instances the answer is no.”

Others have defended the practice of using foreign guest workers, especially in places like South Florida, where tourists and seasonal residents known as “snowbirds” boost activity in the hospitality industry during the winter.

Hospitality during the winter season “is crazy,” said Julia Dattolo, the CEO of CareerSource Palm Beach County, which connects employers with qualified workers in the county where Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club is located.

Dattolo said dozens of country clubs and businesses in the county use guest workers, though she said before hiring foreigners, companies must advertise the jobs to American workers.

“It becomes challenging to fill those jobs, especially with the low unemployment and the cost of living here,” she said.

Chloe East, an associate professor of economics at the University of Colorado Denver who has studied immigration policy, said the US labor market is dependent on foreign-born workers for certain jobs.

“Trump, as have many politicians, uses immigrants as a scapegoat for economic troubles… and for poor-labor market conditions for US born people, but at the same time also understands that immigrants are key parts of the labor market and uses them as workers in his businesses,” East said.

While major overhauls of the nation’s current guest worker programs would require an act from Congress, the future Trump administration could take tougher stances on various forms of authorized and unauthorized immigration, which East said could prove “immensely harmful” for various US businesses.

History of foreign workers

During Trump’s first term in office, the Department of Homeland Security at times increased the number of foreigners that businesses could hire for seasonal work, though the agency also announced in 2018 that it would stop allowing Haitians to get temporary agricultural and seasonal visas (Haitians are now eligible). During the Covid-19 pandemic, the then-Trump administration sought to roll back visas available to people overseas, citing high US unemployment.

Trump’s Make America Great Again vision relies on businesses putting American workers first. He’s derided companies that outsource jobs and relocate manufacturing outside the country. The focus of his criticism, however, has been undocumented immigrants in the country, not workers on visa programs.

The Trump Organization has a long history of using foreign guest workers.

The Department of Labor posts detailed guest worker data going back to 2008 for various types of visas. In that time, Trump businesses requested and received government approval to hire foreign laborers for more than 2,100 positions.

The number of guest workers hired by Trump entities has steadily ticked up over the years. His companies hired about 100 foreigners in 2008. That number grew to more than 200 guest-worker approvals in each of the last two years.

Those guest worker positions offer modest, above-minimum-wage pay. For example, bartenders and servers at Mar-a-Lago hired through the program this year make about $16 an hour with eligibility for overtime, raises and bonuses, according to government data. The positions also require pre-hire drug tests, background checks, “professional appearance” and the ability to speak English.

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