Should illegal aliens get driver's licenses?

The hottest controversy in state legislatures today regards allowing illegal aliens to obtain driver's licenses. Americans were shocked to discover that most of the 19 hijackers on 9/11 carried driver's licenses from Virginia, Florida or New Jersey.

A driver's license is the pass to board a plane, as well as the license to a drive car. It confers a sort of quasi-citizenship and, as described by one illegal alien in Texas, "The driver's license ends up becoming our pass to be in this country."

Since 9/11, 21 states have enacted new legislation to make it harder to get driver's licenses, and legislation has been introduced in another 22 states. Even in Idaho, State Sen. Cecil Ingram told a public hearing, "This has turned out to be a bigger problem than I thought."

The states embarrassed by the 9/11 hijackers have gotten the message. Virginia passed a bill to stop issuing driver's licenses to illegal aliens, and Florida and New Jersey passed legislation to coordinate driver's licenses with immigration visas.

New Jersey, where driver's licenses have been made of paper and do not require a photo, has long been the target of document fraud and counterfeiters. The state is now converting to state-of-the-art digitized driver's licenses with a dozen covert and overt security features, including a mandatory photo, bar code, hologram and digital signature.

Peter Gadiel, whose 23-year-old son James died in the World Trade Center attack, has traveled from Connecticut to Virginia, Maryland, North Carolina and Tennessee to support beefed-up identification laws. Twenty states do not require applicants to prove they are legally in the United States.

Tennessee, another state known to be casual about issuing driver's licenses to illegal aliens, is considering a measure that would require driver's license applicants to present a document showing they are legally in this country. A Tennessee legislative committee also heard testimony about the need to tighten driver's license rules from April Gallop, a survivor of the 9/11 attack on the Pentagon.

Minnesota is trying to address the controversy through rule-making by the Department of Public Safety. The proposed rule would require visitors to present documents to prove they are in the country legally, and the license would expire when their visas expire.

Georgia would seem an unlikely state for immigration controversies, but an estimated 435,000 Hispanics live in Georgia, a 300 percent increase over 1990, according to the U.S. Census. A lively, big group showed up at a hearing in Gainesville from the town of Hall, where at least 19 percent of the population is Hispanic and 85 percent of those are not citizens.

Georgia has been wrangling over a bill that would allow driver's licenses to be obtained by illegal aliens who come only from the "Free Trade Area of the Americas," i.e., from Canada, Latin America and some Caribbean islands.

Among those who spoke against the proposed legislation was retired Col. A.R. "Mac" MacCahan (whose Army unit lost 206 of 212 men fighting in the Korean War). He asked, "What part of illegal don't you understand?" Others ask, why reward people who have committed at least three felonies: illegal entry into the U.S., purchasing fraudulent documents to get a job and misrepresenting the legality of those documents at the workplace?

Kentucky was once one of the easiest states for illegal aliens to get a driver's license. That changed after a 1998 incident in which the Immigration and Naturalization Service arrested a vanload of illegals from Russia who had traveled from New York to Louisville to get driver's licenses.

After that, Kentucky reinstituted a policy of requiring that noncitizens applying for licenses take a written test. County Circuit Clerk Tony Miller said, "We try to be helpful. We offer that test in 21 languages," but Miller didn't explain how it promotes safety to license drivers who can't read the road signs.

Arizona and Mississippi have killed bills to make it easier for illegal aliens to get a driver's license. California Governor Gray Davis has twice vetoed a bill to allow illegal aliens to obtain driver's licenses, but the legislature is still debating this issue.

INS public affairs officer Garrison Courtney identified one of the biggest problems: "If they were illegal when they came here, it's very difficult to determine who they really are because they've created illegal IDs for themselves."

The Seattle Times reported that one U.S. Department of Justice raid discovered piles of cash totaling $95,262, plus $10,000 worth of computer equipment and specialty papers that had been used to print 800 fake driver's licenses, green cards, work permits, Mexican birth certificates and Social Security cards.

Many are concerned about the danger from issuing licenses to terrorists who might use trucks loaded with gasoline or other hazardous materials in the same way that hijackers used commercial airliners on 9/11.

The U.S. Transportation Department reported last year that we lack sufficient safeguards, particularly from the many states that do not require applicants to prove they are legally in the country.

Yea they should be able to get a drivers license ... from what ever country they come from ... if they can pass whatever their home country requires and if they get themselves back there.

As for getting one here ... like the Colonel said, "What part of illegal do you not understand?"

Jeff

Speaking of being choked, there was a whole trailer load of dead ones found today (like the railcar load of dead ones found in recent history). I would like to see a policy of killing the coyotes on sight, no questions no quarter, and escorting the poor shmucks who paid for the trip back to the border.

You're pretty free with accusations>>>>>>

Your post addressed a "guest worker" program for "mexicans".
No other immigrants....

Our legal "green cards" SHOULD already address the illegal
problem, however, this has not slowed the invasion.

Every few years we have *mini* amnesties (for thousands) &
STILL continue to issue green cards. This does not stop the
invasion either.

It's past time for mexico to clean up their cesspool of a
country/government & start taking care of her own citizens.

Let the rich in mexico PAY TAXES to support their own poor.

It's past time for mexico to clean up their cesspool of a country/government & start taking care of her own citizens. Let the rich in mexico PAY TAXES to support their own poor.

Sure, and it's past time for it to stop snowing in the winter.

We have to deal with reality, not wishful thinking. One of the reasons the politicians don't usually think as you do is the fact that this country and US business needs Mexican workers to do a lot of jobs that Americans won't do. If some Mexicans were allowed Guest Worker status, to fill this need, there would be a lot more willingness to clamp down hard on illegals, and thereby control and limit the numbers coming in.

Isn't that what you want?

If some Mexicans were allowed Guest Worker status, to fill this need, there would be a lot more willingness to clamp down hard on illegals, and thereby control and limit the numbers coming in. >>>>>>>>

Fox & friends are demanding "the whole enchilada" for the
MILLIONS already here, & sending 10 BILLION plus home every
year. They can't wait to ship us the other 50 MILLION.

We already HAVE immigration laws, where's the "willingness"
to ENFORCE them ?? Do you think the US has enough jobs for all the "day labor" corners already existing ??

Drivers licenses for illegal aliens??

The next thing they'll tell us is the U.S. government will one day be handing out FREE medical benefits, FREE food and shelter, FREE social security benefits, and FREE education to people who invade our country -- and then have the b@lls to ask American taxpayers to pay for it.

Wait a minute...

>>One of the reasons the politicians don't usually think as you do is the fact that this country and US business needs Mexican workers to do a lot of jobs that Americans won't do. If some Mexicans were allowed Guest Worker status, to fill this need, there would be a lot more willingness to clamp down hard on illegals, and thereby control and limit the numbers coming in.
<<

I have to respectfully disagree. American business does not "need" illegal aliens, they WANT them. Having them (illegal aliens in the available labor pool) allows those businesses to pay minimal wages and no benefits. It also has a curious effect of keeping those businesses from paying a reasonable wage to the non-illegal alien labor pool for the same jobs.

I find it hard to believe that illegal aliens, working for minimum wage, can generate enough unclaimed tax refunds to pay for the support of the families of displaced American workers. In fact, that cannot be the case as un-employment benefits are limited....

The net result is un-employed American workers, with exhausted unemployment benefits, being forced to compete for jobs at third-world wage scales/benefits.

I am a fiscal conservative, but the proposition, that Americans must suffer to help those quarterly bottom-lime figures to enhance stock-holder equity and pay for the CEO's stock-options...rings more than a little hollow.

Regards,

YES !! Yes !!!
You will see a couple years and this is going to be worst then now!
They need to get license. They will be learn to drive and they will get insurance too believe me! Mexicans are nice; they want to be cool here! Run the background check, take the fingerprint and they will be happy to drive safe!

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