Appearing on CNBC’s "Squawk on the Street," David Kelly - chief global strategist at JPMorgan Funds - warned that the U.S. labor force is running out of "well-qualified" American workers. He added: “We actually need more immigration," calling into question any policies that restrict skilled immigrants from entering the U.S. to take jobs that can't be filled by the existing labor pool.

That said, supporters of Trump would argue a wall along the Mexico border (as well as other restrictive measures, would restrict illegal immigration, not legal immigration.

Politics aside, Kelly said, "One of the remarkable things about the labor market over the next 10 years is [that] around 85% of the new growth in the working-age population is going to have to come from immigrants, not from the native-born population."

In a government report that lags its monthy employment snapshot, there were 5.5 million job openings as of the last business day of October, per the most recent JOLTS, or Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey. The Labor Department on Friday morning said the U.S. economy added 156,000 nonfarm payrolls in December, while the unemployment rate ticked up to 4.7 percent. Both were overshadowed by a sharp gain in wages.