Gingrich seeks family-friendly immigration

WASHINGTON, Nov. 23 (UPI) -- The United States should not deport undocumented immigrants if they have been in the country for years, Newt Gingrich said in a GOP White House hopefuls debate.

"I'm prepared to take the heat," the former House speaker said in Washington's DAR Constitution Hall, located across from the circular Ellipse park in front of the White House.

"If you've come here recently, you have no ties to this country, you ought to go home, period," Gingrich said.

"If you've been here 25 years and you got three kids and two grandkids, you've been paying taxes and obeying the law, you belong to a local church, I don't think we're going to separate you from your family, uproot you forcefully and kick you out," he said.

He said Republicans could not claim a family-friendly mantle if they were to "adopt an immigration policy which destroys families that have been here a quarter-century."

Rather than deportation, he advocated a path to permanent residency, not citizenship.

Rep. Michele Bachmann of Minnesota quickly criticized Gingrich, calling his idea tantamount to amnesty.

"If I understood correctly, I think the speaker just said that we would make 11 people -- 11 million people who are here illegally now -- legal," she said.

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney said he was "not going to start drawing lines here about who gets to stay and who gets to go."

"The principle is that we're not going to have an amnesty system that says that people who come here illegally get to stay for the rest of their life in this country legally," he said.

Gingrich said after the 2-hour debate aired by CNN that he had not advocated an amnesty program.

Romney and former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. clashed over Afghanistan.

Romney argued President Barack Obama was removing U.S. troops from the landlocked Islamic republic too quickly. He said if he were in charge, he would maintain a substantial troop presence for several more years.

"I totally disagree," Huntsman said, explaining money spent in Afghanistan could be better used rebuilding the U.S. economy.

"Are you suggesting, governor, that we just take all our troops out next week or what -- what's your proposal?" Romney interjected.

"Did you hear what I just said?" Huntsman retorted. "I said we should draw down from 100,000. We don't need 100,000 troops. We don't need 100,000 troops in Afghanistan."

Huntsman said he favored a force of 10,000 to 15,000, tasked mainly with intelligence gathering and special-forces response capabilities.

In the past, Romney has said he would hope to bring the troops home as soon as possible, based on the views of military commanders.

Huntsman said military commanders sometimes have a narrow view.

"Of course you're going to listen to the generals. But I also remember when people listened to the generals in 1967, and we heard a certain course of action in Southeast Asia didn't serve our interests very well," he said.

Gen. William Westmoreland, who commanded U.S. military operations in the Vietnam War during the peak years of 1964 to 1968, secretly advocated a major U.S. escalation and ground war in 1965, predicting victory by the end of 1967. The U.S. military involvement ended in 1973 and the war ended with the North Vietnamese capture of Saigon in 1975.

Bachmann and Perry clashed over whether Washington should continue funneling aid to Pakistan, given its role in harboring terrorists.

Perry said that he would not send "one penny, period" until Pakistan demonstrated a willingness to cooperate with U.S. interests.

Bachmann, a member of the House intelligence committee, said Perry was "highly naive," given Pakistan's possession of nuclear weapons and the threat of terrorists gaining control of them.

Bachmann said Pakistan was "too nuclear to fail," adding, "The money that we are sending right now is primarily intelligence money to Pakistan. It is helping the United States."

Former Godfather's Pizza Chief Executive Officer Herman Cain said he would help Israel attack Iran if "it was clear what the mission was and it was clear what the definition of victory was."

Romney said he would "stand up to Iran with crippling sanctions."

Gingrich clashed with Rep. Ron Paul of Texas over renewal of the Patriot Act domestic-surveillance law.

"I'd look at strengthening it," said Gingrich, who argued that nuclear terrorism suspects should not be presumed innocent until proven guilty.

Paul said the act was "unpatriotic because it undermines our liberty."

Former Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania said the Patriot Act was needed because America was at war with terrorists and advocated ethnic profiling by the government.

During the Civil War, "Abraham Lincoln ran right over civil rights," he said.

Asked what groups should be profiled for security purposes, Santorum said, "Obviously Muslims would be someone you'd look at."