Dear Immigration Restrictionists: Milton Friedman Was Not On Your Side

THE LATE NOBEL Prize–winning economist Milton Friedman was a free market libertarian who believed that immigrants helped make America great.

- Shikha Dalmia

Yet he has become the restrictionist right’s weapon of choice to expunge the GOP’s pro-immigration faction.

It’s working. The Jack Kemp–style immigration champions are in complete retreat in the GOP, and the ultra restrictionists are on the march.

How has the latter group accomplished this feat? Partly by taking Friedman’s vague and general observation that free immigration is not compatible with the welfare state out of context and repeating it like a mantra at every opportunity. Not an hour goes by without some restrictionist somewhere—on blogs, social media, online comments sections—invoking Friedman’s comment to justify President Donald Trump’s aggressive border enforcement and push to slash immigration.

But these anti-immigrant conservatives are abusing Friedman. If they paid attention to his full remarks instead of conveniently cherry picking what suits them, they’d realize that far from cheering Trump’s draconian immigration crackdown, the great economist would be denouncing Trump as a colossal fool.