NYC’s Bloomberg: Make Detroit a destination for immigrant growth

On Sunday’s Meet the Press, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg addressed the plight of Rust Belt cities — and offered a new solution.

We’ve got a great mayor in Dave Bing, he says. But we need more people. If he had a magic wand, here’s what he’d do — offer every immigrant refuge to America if they agree to live in Detroit for 5 to 10 years. “You would populate Detroit overnight because half the world wants to
come here. You could use immigration policy at no cost to the country
to fix a lot of the problems that we have.”

Excerpt:

Bloomberg made his comments while talking about the economy, and how
jobs are needed but there is a crisis of confidence among business
people looking at Washington politicians, who are too focused on small
issues and can’t come together on larger ones such as immigration.

“This
is a country that was built by immigrants,” Bloomberg said. “This was a
country that became a super power because of its immigrant population.
And unless we continue to have immigrants, we cannot maintain as a super
power.” 

Find out what Detroit leaders are saying about Bloomberg’s comments here.