In an interview with the Catholic television network EWTN last week, Sen. Rand Paul said that the main problem that must be addressed in the immigration debate is that we have “almost defeated the work ethic in our country” and “we’ve destroyed the ethic of work in so much of our population.”

When EWTN anchor Raymond Arroyo asked the Kentucky Republican about the 250 Disney employees who were let go after training their replacements who came to the U.S. on temporary visas, Paul said the U.S. must “look very carefully at how many people we need.”

But he added that immigration is a “two-fold problem” because “we’re rotting from the inside” thanks to unspecified “people” who lack a work ethic.

“We also have almost defeated the work ethic in our country,” he said. “And so, for like picking crops, hard work, if we didn’t bring in migrant labor, we’re rotting from the inside. We have people who really — we’ve destroyed the ethic of work in so much of our population.”