Former Bush Commerce Sec: Use Detroit as 'Test Case' for Immigration Reform

Carlos Gutierrez, who was former President George W. Bush’s Commerce Secretary and now a co-founder of a super PAC actively trying to get an immigration bill passed, recently said that bankrupt Detroit should be a “test case” for comprehensive immigration reform. 

In an interview with Bloomberg News last week, Gutierrez was asked how Detroit could get out of its economic mess. 

Gutierrez argued that Detroit–and the country–needed to “grow the population.” He suggested, “let’s use immigration and let’s use also migration from within the country, but it has to be about growing the population base.”

He insisted Republican Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder needed this “immigration test case” in addition to an “immigration plan” for Detroit “that brings in, whether it is PhDs, farm workers, construction workers.” 

Detroit recently became the largest U.S. city in history to file for bankruptcy. Gutierrez believes a flood of immigrants will solve the city’s economic problems, despite a Heritage Foundation study that claims new immigrants will actually put more of a strain on government resources.