It’s not clear Jeb’s idea would be useful. I think he proposes it because it’s his idea of conservative charity. He can afford it because he knows it will never come to pass. Lets assume his proposal magically becomes law. No current Republican would actually accept lifetime amnesty, citizenship or not. Because doing so would mean that Republicans are opposed to amnesty for some kind of legalistic reason. This would be a misreading, imo. Republicans are opposed to immigration of dark colored folks, end of story.

Furthermore, there’s a conceit Americans like to indulge that immigrants come for that holy grail called “citizenship”. I think it’s far from clear that immigrants give a damn about citizenship, as long as the government won’t hassle them. Which is the real draw of citizenship-immunity from being deported. All the other rights and responsibilities of citizenship range from “meh” (voting) to “pain in the butt” (jury duty). I’d bet a good percentage of natural born citizens could lose their citizenship today, and never know any different for the rest of their lives. If Jeb’s plan of amnesty with a green card in exchange for giving up the possibility of citizenship were to pan out, I’ll bet most illegal immigrants will shrug and say, “Ok, hand over the green card.”

And I’m sure every modern Republican would be overjoyed, amirite?