The New Mexico House of representatives voted to advance a discriminatory driving privilege card bill, 39 for 37 against. House Bill 99 is a measure that would give undocumented workers the euphemistically named “driver privilege cards” instead of drivers licenses. House Bill 99 passed the House on Jan. 27 and now heads to the state Senate.
This bill, backed by Republican Governor Susana Martinez, is part of a several years long attempt by the governor and other anti-immigrant politicians to further alienate and persecute undocumented families by denying driver’s licenses to workers.
Legislation has been rushed under the pretext to have New Mexico comply with the federally mandated REAL ID Act of 2005, this despite the fact that New Mexico has been allowed an extension that allows state licenses to be valid for commercial air travel until Jan. 22, 2018.
El Centro de Igualdad y Derechos, a Latino immigrant led organization based in Albuquerque, has been busy at work raising awareness about the issues surrounding the so-called “driver privilege cards.”
According to El Centro the driver privilege cards “would result in increased racial profiling, discrimination, and targeting of immigrants.” They pointed out that the bill contains a measure that would “require MVD [Motor Vehicle Division] to send information about those immigrants who apply for a ‘driving privilege card’ to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).”
Issuing separate identification cards to undocumented people puts a large target on immigrant families. This proposed measure comes just six months after Homeland Security rolled out the “Priority Enforcement Program,” or PEP, a program intended to detain certain “priority” unauthorized immigrants. The PEP program puts another tool at the disposal of ICE that can be used at their discretion. If the behavior of immigration officials in the past is any indication to what they are capable of, things do not look good for the future. It has already been reported that ICE has been using deceptive tactics, such as posing as a police officer in pursuit of a criminal in the area, in order to illegally enter into the homes of immigrant families.
The driver’s license issue in New Mexico is part of a nationwide mobilization by anti-immigrant forces to further erode what little rights undocumented workers have in the U.S., further criminalizing families.
The first weekend of 2016 saw the capture and imminent deportation of hundreds of children, families and workers, fleeing and seeking asylum from the atrocious violence in Central America.
Immigrant families have very little in the realm of rights despite the huge contribution they make to the wealthy corporations that employ their labor. They are arguably the most exploited sector of the U.S. working class. Despite the super exploitation, immigrants and their allies have mobilized some of the largest demonstrations in history, and continue to fight back against the ever growing anti-immigrant hysteria. It is because of this resistance that Gov. Martinez has been thwarted in trying to implement her plan to deny immigrants drivers licenses.
