Bill would give young immigrants licenses
Bill would give young immigrants licenses
sfgate.com
Nanette Asimov
Updated 10:26 p.m., Saturday, August 25, 2012
Six months after a state deadline for introducing new bills, Democratic lawmakers have found a way to shoehorn a bill into the Legislature to make certain undocumented immigrants under age 31 eligible for a driver's license if they arrived in this country before they were 16.
The law would, for the first time, let about 400,000 undocumented residents apply for licenses. These are the same California immigrants who became eligible in June to work and avoid deportation under a national program of the Obama administration called Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals.
The program affects young undocumented immigrants who are in school, have completed school or have served honorably in the military.
Unlike the governors of Texas, Arizona and Nebraska who have pledged to block efforts to allow such licenses, Gov. Jerry Brown appears open to the idea.
And because of a loophole in state law, Assemblyman Gil Cedillo, D-Los Angeles, was able to create a driver's license bill Friday.
He amended an existing bill, AB2189, loading it up with language to allow license eligibility.
'Gut and amend'
The original bill was to let people use a photograph rather than a signature for identification when renting a car. Its new purpose has the support of the original author, Assemblywoman Nancy Skinner, D-Berkeley, and other Democratic lawmakers.
"It's not an abuse of the process," Cedillo said. "The rules permit making amendments to a bill that's germane - and this is probably the most appropriate amendment for it."
Known as "gut and amend," the process of changing a bill at the last minute has been criticized as a way of slipping in new laws without full public discussion.
But Cedillo said the question of driver's licenses for undocumented immigrants has been debated for years.
California first required proof of legal residency for licenses in 1993. Since then, Cedillo has tried many times to change the law. Democratic Gov. Gray Davis vetoed the effort twice, as did Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
The subject "has been fully vetted and debated now into the second decade," Cedillo said.
He called the bill a safety issue.
"For 60 years, we had the safest highways in America because our strategy was to license all motorists," he said. "Once we started playing immigrant politics with our highways, they became less safe."
GOP leader objects
Assembly Republican leader Connie Conway of Tulare disagreed.
"While well intentioned, this is simply an attempt to mask the president's failure to fulfill his campaign promise to enact comprehensive immigration reform," said Conway, who called the effort "unfair to the thousands of immigrants who are patiently following the legal path to citizenship."
Conway also said the Democrats "should not shove through controversial policies at the end of the legislative year, without public input."
It's unlikely Republicans could block the bill because Democrats hold the majority.
All bills, meanwhile, have to pass through the Legislature by Friday. If approved, AB2189 would move to the governor's desk. Brown has said he wouldn't support licenses for all undocumented immigrants but has suggested that he would favor licenses for those who fall under Obama's new policy.
Nanette Asimov is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: nasimov@sfchronicle.com
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