Some on the left made a big deal out of Texas Gov. Rick Perry statement this weekend that “I think there is a path to citizenship for those young men and women who have served their country. That is a very unique set of individuals, and different than folks who have come here illegally and not given back in that particular way.”
Talking Points Memo‘s Evan McMorris-Santoro thinks he has uncovered some huge contradication: “[Perry] opposes the national DREAM Act debated in the last Congress. But in South Carolina Saturday, he said he supported a main tenet of that bill — that illegal immigrants can earn their citizenship by serving honorably in the military.”
But McMorris-Santoro is just plain wrong. Like Gov. Perry said, illegal aliens already have a path to citzenship through military service. The Heritage Foundation’s Hans von Spakovsky explains: “The Secretary of Defense already has the authority under 10 U.S.C. § 504 (b) to enlist illegal aliens in the military if “such enlistment is vital to the national interest.” And 8 U.S.C. § 1440 allows such aliens to become naturalized U.S. citizens, with their applications handled at accelerated rates.”
The citizenship-through-military-sevice policy was nowhere near “a main tenet” of the DREAM Act. Like everything else the left does on immigration, it was nothing more than a cynical ploy to put the most sympathetic face possible on amnesty. Good for Perry for not falling for it.
