Immigration is the biggest issue for the nation at the moment, contends Phyllis Schlafly, an icon of the conservative movement who has been active for half a century.

In a wide-ranging interview with WND she also urged Republicans in Congress to fight harder for conservative policies and discussed the possibility of a Trump presidency.

Schlafly said the Republican candidates need to be explaining to the American public their views on immigration.

"I think that's the top grass-roots issue at the present time," she told WND. "We want to vet the people who have gotten in here. ... Our method of making people citizens is they have to agree to follow our laws, and they have to agree to never be a public charge.

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"These coming in right now are going right on welfare," she said. "That should not be allowed."

She said the matter is simple: If they cannot make those promises, they don't get in. If their nations don't accept their return, the U.S. should cut off foreign aid to those governments, she said.

"There are so many ways the money could be used on behalf of America," Schlafly said, "and not for the wrong purposes."

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The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals just ruled that President Obama's executive actions to change immigration law and allow millions of illegal aliens to remain in the United States are unconstitutional.

The Obama administration immediately said it would take the case to the U.S. Supreme Court, but Obama might be out of office before the case is decided.

Obama's own words likely would be used against him. He has stated several times that, as president, he does not have the authority to change the law.

Schlafly said the resettlement of refugees and newcomers to the nation is getting out of control.

"Look what happened to Germany," she said. "Germany isn't going to be Germany any more. It's going to be Muslim. We shouldn't allow that to happen."

She said U.S immigration and naturalization laws "are really very good."

"Now we need to obey them," she said. "The idea of just letting anybody in who shows up on the seaboard is simply unacceptable."

Regarding the case against Obama's attempts to change immigration law, she noted the Constitution provides that Congress has the power over immigration.

"And Congress has fallen down on the job."

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Further, she said, Republican members of Congress need to give up the bipartisan talk.

"That's not what politics is," she said. "It's a fight on all the time."

On Trump, she recalled a similarly turbulent time for the GOP establishment when Ronald Reagan got the nomination.

"We survived that because Reagan was a real American and would stand up for America," she said.

She said she believes that is Trump's desire also.

Schlafly also noted the "kingmakers" in the party had difficulty then and likely will again when "they realize they can't name the nominee and that Trump might be the nominee."

But a key component of the presidency is love for America, she said.

"I don't think Obama ever did. I think he wanted America to be like every other country. We don't want to be like every other country. We're better. We're exceptional."

The Obama-negotiated trade deals, especially the Trans Pacific Partnership, are bad, she said, because the U.S. "always gets the short end."

"We are not in favor of treaties made in a closet where nobody else is around. And we think they ought to abide by the Constitution with the two-thirds requirement of the Senate," she said.

A little more than a year ago, WND founder and CEO Joseph Farah wrote a column about Schlafly and her near single-handed defeat of the Equal Rights Amendment. He noted her new book "Who Killed the American Family?" and the republishing of her conservative classic, "A Choice Not an Echo."

"I can't even tell you how important Phyllis Schlafly was in helping me figure out what's really happening in the world and in our country," Farah said.