# George H.W. Bush — "a bridge to America's future" > [!quote] "Nearly all Americans have ancestors who braved the oceans — liberty-loving risk takers in search of an ideal … Immigration is not just a link to America's past; it's also a bridge to America's future." > — George H.W. Bush, Remarks on Signing the Immigration Act of 1990, the White House, November 29, 1990 ## Context Bush signed the Immigration Act of 1990 — the most sweeping reform in 66 years — which *raised* legal immigration ceilings by roughly 40 percent, created the H-1B skilled-worker category, and established the diversity visa lottery. His remarks cast that expansion as both economic strategy and national tradition. Notably, he praised the bill for ending the ideological "litmus tests" of the McCarran-Walter era that [[Harry S. Truman]] had vetoed in 1952. ## Why this matters A second Republican receipt, and a policy one: Bush didn't just praise immigrants rhetorically, he signed a law to admit substantially more of them, framing higher immigration as "a bridge to America's future." This is the establishment-Republican position circa 1990 — pro-growth, pro-skilled-immigration, comfortable with the melting-pot story. It marks how far the party traveled in a single generation toward the restrictionism of [[Immigration Restrictionism]] and the demographic anxiety of [[Great Replacement Theory]]. ## Verification - **Primary source:** [The American Presidency Project, Remarks on Signing the Immigration Act of 1990, November 29, 1990](https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/remarks-signing-the-immigration-act-1990). - **Status:** Verbatim from the official text. Undisputed. ## Related quotes - [[Ronald Reagan - anyone can become an American]] — the predecessor whose closing message Bush carries forward. - [[George W. Bush - the great American tradition of the melting pot]] — his son, sixteen years later, holding the same line as it became untenable in the party. - Featured in [[Presidents on the Nation of Immigrants]].