Newt Gingrich has now run into some hot water with conservatives for advocating an amnesty for illegal aliens who have been in the country over 25 years. On the surface, that proposal doesn’t sound unreasonable. Even I, a hard-line advocate of robust policies to discourage illegal immigration, might be open to such a policy at some point.
However, too much attention has been paid to this recent statement by Gingrich and too little to his past record on illegal immigration.
When he was Speaker of the House, Gingrich worked hard to block the system whereby employers can check the Social Security number of job applicants to make sure they are in the country legally, the program now known as E-Verify. This program is probably the most important tool our nation has for controlling illegal immigration, and Gingrich tried to block it.
Voters should reject Gingrich based on his lack of respect for the sovereignty of the United States as evidenced by his stance on illegal immigration — not because of his recent policy proposal, but because of his reprehensible past record.
