Heritage Foundation Leadership for America

Dan Balz reports an important story that somehow ended up buried in the middle of the A section of today?s Washington Post. In ?Political Splits on Immigration Reflect Voters' Ambivalence,? Balz describes the public?s take on the issue that is quietly splitting the nation. 

Even after a couple months of public debate, immigration, Balz notes, ?still ranks below the war in Iraq, terrorism, health care and the economy on the public's list of priorities, but in many parts of the country -- not just those areas near the Mexican border -- it has become an issue of pressing significance because of its economic, racial and, more recently, national security implications.?

Americans are united, reports Baltz, on the need to secure our borders to protect national security. Where Americans disagree is on what to do with the millions of illegal immigrants already in the country.

Quoted in the Post article, Mark Mellman, a Democratic pollster, sums up the divide in public opinion well: ?There is a clear view that families that are here, that are working, paying taxes and contributing to society, ought to be able to get regularized status. On the other hand, there is a view about not rewarding illegal behavior.?

While the article reports on polling on amnesty for those who are in the country illegally today, an issue on which Americans are passionate and deeply divided, it does not report polling on guest-worker programs that would require current illegal aliens to return to their home countries before applying for legal reentry, such as described in ?Alternatives to Amnesty: Proposals for Fair and Effective Immigration Reform.? This sort of proposal would meet America?s economic needs and allow families that are contributing to society, as Mellman puts it, to become regularized without rewarding illegal behavior. In short, this is the sort of proposal that could bridge the divide over immigration.

The House bill recently passed starts the ball rolling on securing our borders, and the President also has announced a plan. The House?s border security bill is not a complete reform package. As Jim Carafano and Matt Spalding explain in "Bush at the Border,? ?Only a comprehensive package that addresses internal enforcement, border control, citizenship and the rule of law, and cooperation with immigrants? home countries will be sufficient?. Congress should also promote international cooperation and structural economic reforms in Latin America.? Without all of these components, immigration reform will inevitably fall short.

While the polling does show, as Balz reports, that parts of such a comprehensive package will be controversial, there is still good reason to believe that a well designed proposal could win broad public support.

Find all of Heritage?s work on immigration reform here.