An editorial in the latest Bloomberg Businessweek discusses rising GOP star Marco Rubio’s approach to federal immigration policy.

Rubio’s link to the moderate immigration policies of Bush and Republicans past is significant—if the senator wants it to be. Rubio has endorsed no one for President, but Romney and Gingrich are both quick to praise him. With their party facing a lopsided electoral disadvantage among Hispanic voters, Republicans need Rubio, a son of Cuban immigrants, more than he needs them.

This discussion might remind you of Rubio’s comments on immigration during his September 2011 foreign policy address at the Jesse Helms Center in Wingate.

I believe that, all things being equal, people would rather stay in their own countries. If they have economic opportunities in their own nations, if their nations are prosperous and growing, that’s my experience, and the numbers bear it out.

I’ll give you a perfect example: the nation of Chile, or even Brazil. Chile is in line to get a visa waiver, and the reason why is Chileans do not — by and large — illegally immigrate to the United States because they are increasingly having economic opportunities.

And I think that one of the key things we can do to help deal with both the humanitarian and legal aspects of our illegal immigration problem is to do everything we can in Latin America — and, frankly, throughout the world — but in our own hemisphere to encourage the growth and prosperity in our neighbors. And I think we have some places where that’s possible in the short term. I think we’ve seen great progress in places like Chile, Panama, Colombis.

Despite many of its problems, Mexico has tremendous economic promise. Brazil is growing into a significant regional power. … We would want more of the region to go in that direction. And I think if there was more economic opportunity in these countries, if there was more economic growth, if there was more economic development and more political stability, which I think is a precursor to those things, it would make our immigration issue a lot easier to handle, quite frankly, and in addition would provide extraordinary economic opportunities for trade.

Think about it this way: If, all of a sudden, in the next 10 years, millions of people get pulled out of poverty in the Western Hemisphere, that means there are millions of people that can now afford to buy the things that our children and grandchildren are going to invent and build, hopefully. There are more markets for our products, for our ingenuity, … for the things that Americans do, for our services and our goods.

I think that’s tremendous promise. In Florida, in particular, we see the rise in tourism. As you see more prosperity and wealth around the world, you see more and more people from around the world traveling to the United States, spending their money here, visiting our places. These are all positive developments.

So I do think that an integral part of ultimately, in the long term, permanently dealing with the issue of illegal immigration is doing what we can to help,. We can’t impose economic prosperity on anybody, but you can do everything you can to help nations develop economically and grow because if you do that, not only does it impact the illegal immigration problem in our nation, but actually is good for our economy in the long term.