Phil Ammann
Las Vegas becomes the next stop this week for Marco Rubio, as he makes the case — in the form of a new book tour — that failed economic policies of President Barack Obama have put the American Dream in jeopardy.
The senator from Florida, a prospective 2016 Republican presidential candidate, is roaming early primary states to promote his second book, including visits to Iowa and New Hampshire.
“Seven years of government-centered, tax-and-spend liberalism have failed to lift the poor or sustain the middle class,” Rubio writes in American Dreams, Restoring Economic Opportunity for Everyone.
In an interview on Monday with Laura Myers of the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Rubio said that although he will use the Senate floor to push policies giving U.S. workers more opportunity and training, change must ultimately come from the White House.
“I think you can achieve a lot from the Senate,” the 43-year-old said, “but I’m not sure you can lead the country into the 21st century. The president has to do that.”
Rubio’s talk and book-signing tour started in Iowa on Friday, with stops in New Hampshire, two states that hold among the first presidential primary votes in the nation. The Las Vegas stop, as well as one in South Carolina, put his tour in two more early-voting states.
Rubio’s first book, An American Son, focused on his background as a son of Cuban expatriates, which included spending third through eighth grades living in Las Vegas where his mother was a maid and his father a bartender. Much of Rubio’s extended family remains in the southern Nevada area.
“I look forward to coming back,” Rubio said. “We have great affection for Nevada. We look forward to coming back many times.”
As the first presidential caucus in the West, Nevada is an increasingly important state in the presidential campaigns. Mitt Romney, the 2012 GOP nominee, dominated the Nevada caucuses in both 2008 and 2012. For 2016, however, the Republican field seems to be wide open.
“It’s not one of the traditional early states,” Rubio told the Review-Journal. “But I think it’s increasingly important.”
In Nevada, the Hispanic population has grown rapidly, now up to 27 percent of the state’s 2.8 million people. With his background, Rubio is appealing to Hispanic voters, although some support has faded after his failure on comprehensive immigration reform.
When it comes to immigration reform, Rubio advocates a three-step policy: end illegal immigration by securing the borders, update the system so it’s based on merit rather than family ties, and address the undocumented immigrants living in the United states, currenly between 11 million and 12 million people.
Immigration reform will not come through “one massive piece of legislation,” Rubio said.
Another issue is that fellow Floridian Jeb Bush has dominated presidential campaign talk as of late by his massive fundraising push. Nevertheless, Rubio recognizes the former governor would make a good, well-funded candidate. Recent polling in Nevada has both Bush and Rubio as top-tier GOP White House candidates.
