Bush Takes Not-Yet-Campaign to Detroit, Symbol of a Bygone Era

February 4, 2015

By Jonathan Martin, February 04, 2015, Source - New York Times

February 4, 2015

February 4, 2015

February 4, 2015

Former Gov. Jeb Bush of Florida at the National Automobile Dealer’s Association convention in San Francisco on Jan. 23. Max Whittaker for The New York Times

Former Gov. Jeb Bush of Florida delivers his first presidential campaign-style speech at a Detroit Economic Club luncheon today, and the location says nearly as much about the race he intends to run as the words he will use.

By choosing Detroit — which emerged from bankruptcy in December — rather than a city in an early-primary state like Iowa or New Hampshire, Mr. Bush is drawing on a two-pronged bit of symbolism.

He wants to use the beleaguered city as a backdrop for his message about income inequality and economic opportunity. And speaking in a region that, thanks to the auto industry, was a hub of middle-class stability before falling on hard times dovetails with Mr. Bush’s aim to center his campaign on reviving social mobility and increasing wages.

“He will speak about the journey Detroit has been on,” an adviser says.

Mr. Bush is also signaling that he wants to “create growth for everybody,” as the adviser put it, by making his address in a heavily black city that has few Republican voters. Politically speaking, it is an indication that his message and schedule will have more in common with a general election campaign than a primary race. It is an approach that he and his advisers think is necessary if Republicans are to win back the White House in a country with rapidly shifting demographics.

Mr. Bush has not ventured this year to Iowa or New Hampshire, and he is still testing campaign themes and raising money. He is spending much of his time on the latter, in wealthy enclaves far removed from the foreclosed homes and vacant lots in the city of Detroit.

But by starting there, Mr. Bush wants to set the tone for a different sort of primary campaign. Whether he can stick to it will say much about him and his party.