DAILY BEAST: On Tuesday morning, the Bush Center held a conference on immigration and economic growth at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. It was only the second major policy speech the former president has delivered since leaving office, and Bush let himself wax poetic on the subject of immigration: “Not only do immigrants help build our economy, they invigorate our soul.”
The fact that Romney received just 27 percent of Hispanic vote, eight years after Bush got 44 percent, was not far from attendees’ minds, even though Romney’s name went unmentioned. Instead, the conference was an extended argument for the economic benefits of immigration, offering a new policy booklet to that effect (PDF). It was also by implication a meditation on the comprehensive immigration reform Bush backed in his second term, only to see it cannibalized by talk radio conservatives such as Rush Limbaugh and those politicians who choose to pander to them, including Romney.
Economic growth, the angle taken in arguing for more immigration, was telling. This framing was designed to be accepted by the Republican base, making a pro-business case for immigration rather than extolling the cultural benefits of increased diversity. And while the keynote speech by James K. Glassman focused on the heroic CEO narrative of immigration—invoking Andy Grove and Sergey Brin, and the illuminating statistic that 25 percent of the nation’s start-ups are founded by immigrants—Glassman also took care to make an economic argument for low-skilled immigration. This is not a typical Tea Party applause line… (more)
