Gingrich's Brave Almost-Amnesty Immigration Plan

COMMENTARY | Newt Gingrich's controversial immigration plan may be his campaign's biggest liability. Primary opponent Michele Bachmann claims Gingrich's program provides amnesty to illegal immigrants. Gingrich's plan carefully avoids using the term "amnesty." Though he might not like the word, Gingrich's goal of providing illegal immigrants a pathway to "earned legality" certainly looks like amnesty by any other name to me. And that may be a good thing.

America's problems with illegal immigration will not be a make or break issue for my vote. That's because I have decided that, rather than emphasize issues, it's more sensible to vote for candidates whose ideas and record indicate the sort of creative problem solving our country so desperately needs.

Gingrich's plan calls for American to be, first and foremost, a "nation of laws." I assume the majority of all voters would support that goal. The concern for conservatives is that providing a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants would subvert the rule of law and encourage disregard for important procedural safeguards. Pro-citizenship groups respond by highlighting illegal immigrants' deep roots and family connections. Per usual, conservatives and liberals have staked out territory on opposing sides of this "either/or" battle. Gingrich's plan tries to bridge the divide. So I like it.

Gingrich's plan tries to assuage fears about a pathway to citizenship by offering a new status ("legality") that could be achieved by an application and new process. Gingrich uses the term "reconcile" to indicate that we can no longer simply ignore the reality that, legal or not, our country is populated with well-established non-citizens who make valuable contributions to our economy and culture. Gingrich wants to "control the border" and institute a new visa system, including an outsourced guest worker program. These provisions should appeal to conservatives, but the potential for illegal immigrants to avoid deportation could make the plan palatable to liberals. Therefore, Gingrich's plan stands as the most realistic approach to immigration among the Republican primary candidates.

Gingrich calls for a process that can "distinguish at the human level." The review process Gingrich proposes sounds cumbersome and expensive. But compared to the economic and moral cost of mass deportation, Gingrich's practicality has greater appeal. My chief concern with Gingrich's approach is the danger in allowing two classes of Americans to coexist while leaving power firmly in the hands of legal citizens. But I haven't yet seen a better proposal.

Before Gingrich announced his plan, I viewed him and his campaign as generically conservative and mostly irrelevant. I think his immigration plan comes awfully close to providing amnesty, but this shows a willingness to engineer creative compromises. That's what Americans - both citizens and non-citizens - need most.