House Republicans leaders are currently drafting a list of principles to guide any upcoming immigration legislation, but the final product seems unlikely to provide any true reform. The Senate bill passed last year created a special path to citizenship for the millions of illegal immigrants in the U.S. with only token attention given to renewed border enforcement provisions, while the House at the time insisted on real border security improvements before moving forward with legalization. Now that the time seems to have come for the House to take up the issue, suddenly their enforcement rhetoric doesn’t seem so solid.

The new House plan appears to embrace a path to legalization that includes fines and payment of back taxes after a border security plan is in place. But there are no mentions of any benchmarks for the new enforcement provisions, only the need to have them in place. In other words, enforcement could be a complete failure, but that won’t stop legalization from moving forward, which is what Democrats have wanted all along. They see millions of potential voters and they will do anything to get them legalized and legitimized. Businesses likewise see a whole new crop of cheap labor, so they are also pushing heavily for legalization regardless of any other consequence.

Amnesty, of course, will mean that virtually overnight millions more people will have access to federal and state welfare programs, Medicare, and ObamaCare, totaling nearly $160 billion in additional deficit spending. Right now, the House GOP seems to be the only institution that has the capability of preventing an amnesty disaster. Yet, they are more wrapped up in the politics of the moment than the principles of the ages. What they need to do is fall back on the basic principles of reform, and stick to them. Enhance security and enforcement efforts, reform the bureaucracy of the legal immigration system, reject amnesty, and enforce existing laws. Part of the problem with the immigration system now is that, thanks to Barack Obama, the federal government picks and chooses its immigration policy based on the potential political gain for Democrats. The GOP will not improve its fortunes – not to mention do what’s best for the nation – by aiding those ends.