Thread: Schumer: use Social Security cards to cut illegal immigratio

Schumer: use Social Security cards to cut illegal immigration
By BEN DOBBIN

Associated Press Writer

5:16 PM EST, November 5, 2007

ROCHESTER, N.Y.

Sen. Charles Schumer sidestepped the heated debate over driver's licenses for illegal immigrants once again Monday, saying the best way to cut illegal immigration is through Social Security cards.

Schumer and fellow New York Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton have so far avoided endorsing Gov. Eliot Spitzer's plan to offer three types of licenses: one for crossing the Canadian border, another to board domestic flights and a third for illegal immigrants for driving and identity purposes.

The plan is part of a deal struck with the Department of Homeland Security last month to push through the federal Real ID Act, a law to make driver's licenses more secure and keep them out of the hands of would-be terrorists.

Under Spitzer's plan, two types of licenses would meet or exceed the Real ID standards, while the third version would not meet those standards but would be available to illegal immigrants.

Asked about Spitzer's plan, Schumer talked about certain aspects without saying whether he actually supports or opposes it.

"I am for, at the federal level, Real ID, which doesn't countenance illegal immigrants to use driver's licenses for any purpose at all," Schumer said. He then added that he would fight illegal immigration through Social Security ID cards, which he claimed would cut the flow of illegals by 80 percent.

"The most important thing I've done on this area is I have come up with this proposal for a biometric Social Security card with your picture that everyone would have to present before they got a job," he said. "If the employer hired someone who didn't present a legitimate card, they'd get huge fines."

Schumer's answer was about as enlightening as the one Clinton gave Sunday, when she said: "I broadly support what governors like Elliot Spitzer are trying to do."

Left unsaid by both is what they think of the actual Gov. Spitzer and his actual plan.

In western New York, the changes in border rules are closely scrutinized for the potential impact on local tourism and trade.

The Bush administration will require passports to drive across the border beginning in summer 2008, but Spitzer's plan would mean that for an extra fee, New York drivers could get a license that could be used at the border instead of a passport.

In the past, Clinton has said changing the border passport rule to allow driver's licenses doesn't go far enough, because it doesn't do anything for children under 16, many of whom cross the border with youth sports teams.

Associated Press Writer Devlin Barrett in Washington, D.C., contributed to this report.

Copyright © 2007, The Associated Press

http://www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/ ... rint.story

Any kind of card the government can create, someone can duplicate.

A card, an ID, is not the answer. All the government needs to do is make some of the SS records available to employers. Give them the technology to log into the system, and check the info of the SS card being presented. Just to check the date of birth and the sex. That will weed out quite a few.

If you have a number given you and SS shows it to be Mary Smith, born 1934, in Idaho - and what you have standing in front of you is someone who is Hispanic, male and mid-twenties - enough said.

Also, if the number presented shows it to be Manuel Rodriguez, born 1998, in Texas and the person standing in front of you is obviously an adult - enough said.

Then arrest those people for using fraudulent documents, fingerprint them, photograph them, and send them back to Mexico.

That would go a long way to fixing the problem.

I read that the latest scheme is that the illegals give their anchor kids their name and then that anchor gets the SS card and that is the card they use.....so it looks like a legit card