Anthony Bourdain: 'Every Restaurant In America Would Shut Down' If Donald Trump Were President

Donald Trump

During an appearance on Sirius XM this week, CNN host and celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain said America's restaurant industry would collapse if Republican White House hopeful Donald Trump actually got the chance to enact his proposed deportation of undocumented immigrants.

“If Mr. Trump deports 11 million people or whatever he is talking about right now, every restaurant in America would shut down,” he told host Pete Dominick on Sirius XM’s “Stand Up!” on Wednesday.

“Like a lot of other white kids, I rolled out of a prestigious culinary institute and went to work in real restaurants,” Bourdain said.

“Walking into restaurants, the person who had been there the longest and took the time to show me how it was done was always Mexican or Central American,” he added.“[They are] the backbone of the industry."

Bourdain cited his 30 years in the culinary industry and time as a restaurant executive.

“Twenty of those years, I was a manager and employer,” he said. "Never in any of those years, not once, did any American-born kid walk into my restaurant and say, ‘I’d like a job as a night porter or a dishwasher or even a prep cook.’

(h/t JMG)