Driver's Licenses and Illegal Immigrants

As of Friday, September 5, 2003, California Governor Gray Davis, in a pathetic act of desperation by the soon-to-be-ex-Governor, signed a bill that would give illegal immigrants the right to have a legal California Driver's License. Twice in the past, the governor refused to sign it, saying it created a security risk. Still, with no security protections in the bill, he has signed it into law. The bill contained insufficient safeguards against the possibility that a terrorist could obtain a license to drive. He would support an amended bill, he said, if it contained "certain common-sense protections" such as a provision for background checks. But even those few protections that were in the earlier bill were stripped from the one he signed in September, demonstrating just how malleable the governor's convictions can be with his political hide on the line. If Osama bin Laden himself were to sneak into the country (and what's stopping him?) he could stroll right into any DMV office and sign up for his very own driver's license when the bill takes effect January 1, 2004.

This bill directs the California DMV to accept Mexican government documents as valid forms of identification from driver's license applicants. And, repeals the requirement that applicants present proof to the DMV of their legal presence in the United States.

Sadly, LAPD Chief William Bratton and other local police honchos also support the measure, illustrating why it's best to be skeptical whenever a new law or a candidate is said to be, "supported by law enforcement." There is often a wide gap between what is supported by the brass and what is supported by the troops. And a lot of California citizens think of this new law, as a joke.

Bratton's rationale for supporting the new law is that it requires the DMV to institute a “biometric database”, i.e. fingerprints records, to ensure that no one fraudulently obtains a second license under a new identity. With this provision, argued Bratton and others, the DMV will have a database accessible to police officers conducting investigations, and with every applicant identified by a fingerprint, solving crimes will be that much easier. Not exactly, written into the law, down there in the pesky fine print, is a provision that, "prohibits the DMV from selling, transmitting, exchanging, matching, or otherwise providing to third parties including, but not limited to, federal, state, or local governmental agencies, any biometric identifiers, or data containing the biometric identifiers, in DMV's possession."

Currently, a detective investigating, let’s say a murder, can query a DMV database and obtain photographs, addresses, and vehicle information on possible suspects. But under the new law, that detective will be required to obtain a subpoena or a search warrant if he wants to compare a fingerprint