Agreed.
If you look at Gingrich's "solutions" page you will see that he calls for "objective" standards by which community boards must judge the worthiness of the applicant to stay in America.
I do not understand how one can make the more subjective criteria, such as church attendance, "objective." I understand that one might demand documentary evidence to support that assertion that one has been in the country for 25 years. I am less concerned about that feature.
But what about the problem of subjective interpretation? Can we really believe that a board of review in Berkeley will not consciously subvert the entire process and rule that every applicant meets the criteria? If that becomes the case, as I believe it will, the underground telegraph will soon inform every illegal alien they should go to a sanctuary city like Berkeley to get a good report. Ultimately, the entire process is subverted.
I think Gingrich's suggestion is unworkable but I do not think that that, in logic, compels the conclusion that he therefore wants amnesty. He has explicitly denied that he wants amnesty. I don't like what he wants but I at least want to accurately describe what he says he wants.
Straight up, I will tell you what bothers me about Gingrich’s statements: he says everything except, “Let’s uphold the immigration laws”.
Newt Gingrich would invent an extra-Constitutional form of citizenship for illegal aliens, and anyone with sense knows that it is only to satisfy employers who do not want to pay a living wage to U.S. workers. SCOTUS would strike it down in a heartbeat.
I do not advocate splitting up families because the whole family should be deported. Children go with parents. Just because a person is born here doesn’t automatically mean they’re a citizen.
The 14th Amendment has bee misinterpreted time and again.
From the Holding of the Supreme Court in the Wong Kim Ark case:
“The evident intention, and the necessary effect, of the submission of this case to the decision of the court upon the facts agreed by the parties were to present for determination the single question stated at the beginning of this opinion, namely, whether a child born in the United States, of parents of Chinese descent, who, at the time of his birth, are subjects of the Emperor of China, but have a permanent domicil and residence in the United States, and are there carrying on business, and are not employed in any diplomatic or official capacity under the Emperor of China, becomes at the time of his birth a citizen of the United States. For the reasons above stated, this court is of opinion that the question must be answered in the affirmative.”
Per Leo Donofrio - This holding has been the subject of enormous dispute in the United States. The “holding”, which is controlling US law, contradicts much of the “dicta“, which is not considered legal precedent...the actual holding of the court is limited to “the single question” of whether the children of aliens who have a “permanent domicil and residence in the United States” are 14th Amendment citizens.
The holding does not specifically grant 14th Amendment citizenship to persons born in the US of illegal aliens, or even of those here temporarily (tourists and students). Numerous legislative attempts have been made on both sides of the Congressional aisle – as well as in a multitude of States – to clarify this holding by statute as to the children of illegal immigrants (aka “anchor babies”).
http://naturalborncitizen.wordpress.com/2011/03/06/the-obama-administration-quietly-scrubbed-the-foreign-affairs-manual-in-august-2009-to-expand-the-holding-of-wong-kim-ark/
I am weary of excuses as to why we here in the United States cannot enforce our immigration laws, and no, I do not want a class of immigrants here like those from Turkey living in Germany. This is the U.S. and you are either a citizen, citizen-to-be, or a visitor-soon-to-depart.