By Clint Bolick

Wall Street Journal,

January 1, 2015

As Jeb Bush explores a 2016 presidential bid, several conservative pundits are inciting the Republican base against him by reducing his immigration agenda to a one-word caricature: amnesty. “Jeb Bush wants it,” Rush Limbaugh said on Dec. 17. Iowa talk-show host Steve Deace said four days later; “He’s not just for amnesty; he’s an apostle for it.”

Such critics either don’t understand the meaning of the word amnesty, or they are unfamiliar with Mr. Bush’s positions. He has set forth a comprehensive proposal to reform the nation’s immigration policies—and if conservatives get past false depictions and consider his ideas on the merits, they will find much to applaud.

Mr. Bush is passionately pro-immigration, which may set him apart from some on the right. But he is also passionately pro-rule of law, a principle that guides his entire immigration strategy.

That principle led him to strongly criticize President Obama for his executive actions first legalizing the status of young people brought here illegally by their parents in October 2012, and then deferring enforcement action against the adults in November. Mr. Bush does believe that children who were brought here illegally and some adults should be eligible for legalized status once certain conditions are met. But he knows that the Constitution gives authority over naturalization to Congress, not the president—and that short-term, politically expedient executive actions do more to stifle enduring reform than to aid it.

Mr. Bush’s immigration agenda is set forth in “Immigration Wars: Forging an American Solution,” which he and I co-wrote in 2013. His agenda focuses less on the people who are here illegally than on who is allowed and not allowed to come legally, because that is the root of the problem with the immigration system. [More]