Former US president George W Bush resurfaces as immigration advocate against Republican tide
- The 74-year-old Texan is enjoying a resurgence of sorts in the aftermath of Trump’s erratic tenure
- In an interview, Bush said the Republican Party has become ‘isolationist, protectionist, and to a certain extent nativist’
Out of office for a dozen years and still castigated for his “war on terror”, former US president George W Bush has resurfaced as a passionate immigration advocate just as his Republican Party careers in the opposite direction.
The 74-year-old Texan, whose invasion of Iraq and failure to implement immigration reform helped give rise to Donald Trump, is enjoying a resurgence of sorts in the aftermath of Trump’s erratic tenure.
With Bush nostalgia evident, the 43rd president who normally lays low has released Out of Many, One, a book featuring 43 of his own oil paintings of immigrants he has come to know.
In a Washington Post column last week, Bush said he compiled the book of portraits of immigrants who have embraced their adopted country as a way to help lower the temperature and “humanise the debate on immigration” in the US.
But the man who once served as governor from a state on the front lines of the political fight over border security also unleashed fierce criticism of his own party and its antagonistic anti-immigrant stance.