Donald Trump Takes Elon Musk’s Side In H1B Visa Fight

Happy Monday! It’s December 30, 2024, and this is The Morning Shift, your daily roundup of the top automotive headlines from around the world, in one place. Here are the important stories you need to know.

1st Gear: Trump Sides With Musk On H1B Visas

The deeply online section of the Republican party has fractured over the past few days, as Elon Musk and Laura Loomer have gone at each other’s throats on Twitter over H1B visas. Musk, who may have worked in the U.S. illegally before getting his paperwork in order, supports the visas; Loomer, a sort of alt-right homunculus who wants a white ethnostate, does not. President-elect Donald Trump, it seems, is team Musk. From Automotive News:

President-elect Donald Trump sided with key supporter Elon Musk in a public dispute over the use of the H-1B visa, saying he fully backs the program for foreign tech workers opposed by some of his supporters.

Trump’s Dec. 28 remarks followed a series of social media posts from Musk, the CEO of Tesla Inc. and SpaceX, who vowed Dec. 27 to go to “war” to defend the visa program for foreign tech workers.

Trump, who moved to limit the visas’ use during his first presidency, told The New York Post on Saturday he was likewise in favor of the visa program.

“I have many H-1B visas on my properties. I’ve been a believer in H-1B. I have used it many times. It’s a great program,” he was quoted as saying.

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The altercation was set off earlier last week by far-right activists who criticized Trump’s selection of Sriram Krishnan, an Indian American venture capitalist, to be an adviser on artificial intelligence, saying he would have influence on the Trump administration’s immigration policies.

This debate seems to be an interesting view at the divide between Musk’s white supremacy — where foreign workers can still come in as second-class citizens and be used for labor, with their place in the country tied to their work — and Loomer’s white nationalism, in which melanin is checked at the border. This is a real political debate in American in 2024. We live in hell.

2nd Gear: GM Spent $6 Billion On Stock Buybacks In 2024

Yahoo Finance has an end-of-year roundup for the major automakers, with an eye towards their plans and standing for 2025. Much of it concerns the future of EVs under the Trump administration, but there’s one little fact about GM that stands out: It spent $6 billion on its own stock last year. From Yahoo Finance:

GM (GM) shareholders were rewarded with the stock up 25% for the year, buoyed by GM’s aggressive accelerated share repurchase (ASR) programs, a type of buyback. GM announced a $6 billion ASR in June of this year, following a $10 billion ASR in November of 2023.

Stock buybacks are great for execs whose pay is determined by stock performance, and in the short term they’re great for investors. Of course, in the long term those investors will have their money in a company that spent its billions on “line go up” rather than developing competitive vehicles, but who cares about that? The line went up!

3rd Gear: The Pandemic Era Of Car Sales Is Over

Since 2020, it’s been tough to get a good deal on a new car. Every year, though, it’s gotten slightly easier than the year prior. Now, finally, we’re getting back to the point of genuine discounts on new cars. From the Wall Street Journal:

After years of depressed inventory stemming from pandemic-era supply chain problems, U.S. dealers’ stock levels have largely recovered. That has put pressure on retailers and automakers to more aggressively price their unsold vehicles.

Car buyers received about $3,400 in discounts and other incentives on average during the busy December shopping season, up more than 25% from a year earlier, according to research firm J.D. Power. The offers have included low- and zero-percent interest rates, cash-back offers and cheap leases, especially on electric vehicles.

The increase in promotions in recent months has offered inflation-weary car shoppers some relief after several years of having to shell out sums near or even above the sticker price. The stronger promotions have helped boost overall U.S. vehicles sales.

Industrywide U.S. sales rose by about 7% in December, according to a J.D. Power forecast. Most automakers are scheduled to report their latest sales tallies Friday.

Forecasts show sales increasing next year, but by a much smaller margin than their increase for 2024. Maybe automakers will start throwing more cash on hoods, getting more cars out the door, or maybe they’ll keep spending their money on the blessed Line. It must go up, you know.

4th Gear: The Detroit Auto Show’s Leader, Bless His Heart, Wants To Restore Its Former Glory

Auto shows are doing really well right now, if you hadn’t heard, and the Detroit Auto Show wants to be top of the heap. Its new leader wants to bring the show back to its glory days, using the power of broadcast journalism and the Detroit Lions. From the Detroit Free Press:

So while the Geneva and Frankfurt, Germany, auto shows have ceased to exist, the Detroit Auto Show has returned to its traditional January slot with bold plans that build on past successes while forging new traditions.

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A Detroit Auto Show will spotlight not just new cars — more than 30 brands including an estimated $10 million in ultra-luxury vehicles — but also downtown bars and restaurants and sporting events and history and cultural institutions.

“People want to say that the auto show isn’t what it used to be. But the world isn’t what it used to be,” said [Sam] Klemet, co-executive director of the Detroit Auto Show and the Detroit Auto Dealers Association. “There’s this thought that auto shows are really struggling. But I see this as an evolution. I love this city. This will be a stage for the city to show itself off.”

Is it a “thought” that auto shows are struggling, or are auto shows in fact just struggling? Could it perhaps have something to do with the average new car transaction price being nearly 1.3 times the median U.S. annual income? Who wants to go to a packed convention center and catch COVID just to look at cars you can’t afford to touch?

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