President Donald Trump will likely extend his battle against diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies into changes of an often overlooked visa program.
“Clearly, we are in a paradigm shift; the manner in which ‘national interest’ is defined, is dynamic and evolving,” Joshua Bratter, one of country’s leading authorities on immigration, told Fox News Digital.
The comments come as Trump has continued to fight against DEI policies across the federal government, a battle that is likely to extend into Trump’s revamp of U.S. immigration policies.
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Bratter believes part of that shift will be seen in how potential migrants are vetted under the EB-2 Visa National Interest Waiver category, a type of visa that Bratter said “surged” during the Biden administration.
“This category was designed originally for a highly skilled engineer who was building infrastructure in the United States, and it was for an architect and designer of bridges. So you look back to the legislative intent, and it was to provide a category that was expedited and free of the traditional job offers based on advancing a U.S. national interest,” Bratter said.
What exactly defines the national interest is likely to change from administration to administration, Bratter noted, arguing that Trump is likely to shift away from the DEI and climate focus of the previous administration.
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“This administration, as they had in their prior term, reflected interest in areas like space exploration, military defense, military exploration, space exploration, emerging technologies, use of artificial intelligence for the purposes of optimization and efficiency in the workplace,” Bratter said.
That is a shift away from Biden, who focused more on “sustainable energy, renewable energy, areas of climate.”
“These are areas that this administration has indicated do not reflect U.S. national interests. And national interest is a very niche, specialized area that focuses on a unique class of individuals,” Bratter said.
Bratter also pointed to the Trump administration’s interest in cryptocurrency and its broader move toward overall efficiency in government overall with the creation of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
“When you have an administration that has included in issues like DOGE and efficiency and emerging technology and the idea of potentially a crypto reserve within the dialog of their goals, you begin to see that the national interest may begin to shift to reflect goals that are consistent with those objectives,” Bratter said.
