Republican presidential candidates Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney have recently been sparring over immigration reform. Gingrich made a daring political move within the past two weeks to re-center the republican debate along the lines of immigration reform, a wedge issue that could have a serious effect come primary season. Gingrich takes the position that immigrants that "if you've been here 25 years and you got three kids and two grandkids, you've been paying taxes and obeying the law, you belong to a local church, I don't think we're going to separate you from your family, uproot you forcefully and kick you out." In other words, Gingrich believes that amnesty is justified in special situations.
Within the past week, Romney has taken this opportunity to strengthen his political image with the republican base by requiring illegal immigrants to follow the same process as other legal immigrants, “12 million or so that are here illegally, should be able to sign up for permanent residency or citizenship, but they should not be given a special pathway, a special guarantee that all of them get to stay here for the rest of their lives merely by virtue of having come here illegally, and that, I think, is the great flaw in the final bill that came forward from the Senate."
This battle has extremely important implications for both Romney and Gingrich who are both in the process of courting voters as primary season approaches. Romney’s position will certainly give him an edge when it comes to reassuring the conservative base of his credentials. In a race where Romney has often been seen as the mainstream alternative to more right wing opponents, being able to place yourself right of the human incarnation of conservatism, former speaker Newt Gingrich, will do wonders for his credibility with the republican base. Gingrich on the other hand may be able to court the 40 million Latinos in the United States legally (Religion, Race and the American Presidency, pg 239), while garnering favor from the 12 million Latino illegal immigrants.
To view a press conference where Romney articulates his position on immigration go to:
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