Posted on 10/27/2003 1:00:53 PM PST by CIBvet
California should be punished if it doesn't repeal its law allowing illegal immigrants to obtain driver licenses, a leading immigration control advocate in Congress said in San Diego yesterday.
"The federal government has a responsibility to say that if you do this, we will in fact penalize you in some way," Colorado Republican Tom Tancredo said.
Tancredo has introduced legislation to withhold as much as 25 percent of federal highway funds from any state that passes legislation allowing illegal immigrants to get licenses. He also plans to introduce two other bills to penalize those states, one denying them federal Homeland Security funds and the other prohibiting their driver licenses from being accepted as identification to board airplanes.
"A driver's license is essentially a key to the kingdom of this country," said Tancredo, who is chairman of the Congressional Immigration Reform Caucus.
"They are as close to a national photo ID as we have, so naturally there are national implications to any state action directed at giving licenses to people who are here illegally," he said after his speech to San Diego members of a conservative group, Adam Smith of California.
Tancredo introduced the legislation to withhold highway funds in September, shortly after Gov. Gray Davis signed a bill that will grant licenses to as many as 2 million illegal immigrants beginning Jan. 1. U.S. Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-El Cajon, introduced legislation similar to Trancredo's this month.
Tancredo's visit to San Diego came one day after Gov.-elect Arnold Schwarzenegger said that if the Legislature doesn't repeal the driver license law, he will support a referendum asking voters to reject it.
The California Republican Assembly, which is leading the referendum drive, has until Dec. 7 to collect 373,816 signatures to qualify the measure for the March ballot. As of yesterday, it had collected 50,000, its Web site said.
Tancredo expressed doubt that Schwarzenegger can persuade the Democratic-controlled Legislature to repeal the law.
"I don't think your Legislature is going to renege on this, and the governor can't unilaterally do anything about it," Tancredo told reporters after his speech.
Michele Waslin, a policy analyst for the National Council of La Raza, which supports the license law, said Tancredo's bill won't be popular with states because it interferes with their right to administer driver licenses.
She said Tancredo exaggerates the threat that giving licenses to undocumented immigrants weakens national security.
"Giving people licenses means making our roads safer," Waslin said. " . . . We don't think issuing driver's licenses should be based on immigration status. People at (the Department of Motor Vehicles) are not immigration agents."
In his speech yesterday, Tancredo emphasized the dangers of massive immigration and multiculturalism. He told reporters later the drivers legislation would encourage more illegal immigration and make it easier for illegal immigrants to remain in the country.
One of Tancredo's complaints about the California law – that it has serious security problems – is shared by people outside the immigration debate.
The legislation allows illegal immigrants to obtain licenses using a federal taxpayer ID number in lieu of a Social Security number. They also must submit a copy of their birth certificate, a thumbprint and a photo ID, which can include foreign-issued documents such as Mexico's matricula consular.
State Sen. Debra Bowen, D-Marina del Rey, who is considered one of the legislature's experts on identity theft, abstained from voting on the bill after supporting earlier versions with stronger security measures.
Bowen isn't worried about illegal immigrants getting licenses because she thinks most will use them as the law's supporters intended – to drive to work.
Instead, her concern is that criminals and other dishonest people, including U.S. citizens, will claim they don't have a Social Security number and apply for a license using a taxpayer ID, which is easier to get.
"Somebody who wants to eliminate a driving record that is causing them insurance points or a suspended license, this gives them a way that is not too hard to create a fraudulent identity and get a new driver's license," Bowen said.
Critics say the taxpayer ID and the matricula are more open to fraud than Social Security numbers. They also complain about the absence of an electronic fingerprint checking system.
The taxpayer ID was created in 1996 by the Internal Revenue Service so people who aren't eligible for Social Security numbers can file tax returns. That group includes undocumented immigrants and foreign-based owners of businesses in the United States.
An IRS spokesman said the agency doesn't attempt to verify the authenticity of the documents people submit to get the ID numbers. Applicants don't have to apply in person, and a third party can apply on their behalf.
Only one-third of the 6 million taxpayer ID numbers already issued are being used for tax purposes. Immigration experts said they believe illegal immigrants are instead using them to open bank accounts and to apply for driver licenses in some states.
The IRS is so concerned about the widening use of the taxpayer ID that in August it sent a letter to the nation's motor vehicle directors, warning them that accepting the document as proof of identification posed "potential security risks."
The Department of Motor Vehicles has no way to verify the authenticity of taxpayer ID numbers, although there is such a system to verify Social Security numbers.
The photo ID the Mexican government issues through its consulate offices in the United States is more secure than the taxpayer ID because it has a photo and invisible anti-forgery features. Applicants also must apply in person.
While hundreds of local police departments accept the matricula as a valid ID, the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security say it's not reliable because Mexico lacks a central database to ensure that people aren't getting matriculas under different names at various consulate offices.
Mexican officials said they expect to set up such a database soon and are making other security improvements.
Marti Dinerstein, a researcher at the Center for Immigration Studies, doesn't think Mexico's matricula should be accepted in the United States, but she's more troubled by the prospect of illegal immigrants from other countries getting California licenses.
"There are a lot of people who are living illegally in California who are not Mexicans, and some of them come from countries that the United States believes might harbor terrorists," Dinerstein said. "These people will be able to get California driver's licenses just like a Mexican illegal immigrant will be."
Some law enforcement groups that originally supported the driver license legislation, including the state's DMV investigators and the state Attorney General's Office, withdrew their backing when the bill failed to include a fingerprint checking system to make sure applicants don't have licenses under different names.
Although applicants must provide thumbprints, the new law doesn't require the prints be checked against a database. Instead, they are filed away and pulled out only when they are needed for a match against a print on another license.
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Leonel Sanchez: (619) 542-4568;
leonel.sanchez@uniontrib.com
Really, Ms. Waslin? Tell me how. Specifically. And don't give me any bull-pucky about illegals buying insurance or going to driving school. That nonsense won't wash.
Yeah, that's what I thought. You're just full of it.
Freepmail me if you wish to be removed from or added to this list!
Hey Debra! Didn't anyone tell you? It is ILLEGAL for them to work without authorization. So in effect, what you want to do is to enable them to commit an illegal act?
Aren't you supposed to uphold our laws and not promote the breaking of them?
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