Lawmakers fight suggestion of immigrant identification cards
By LEE PROCIDA Staff Writer, 609-457-8707
Published: Saturday, January 10, 2009

State legislators from the 9th district on Friday called on Gov. Jon S. Corzine to reject what may be an immigration advisory panel's recommendations to provide driver's identification cards and in-state tuition to illegal immigrants.

Earlier this week, the Blue Ribbon Advisory Panel on Immigration Policy finalized a report that makes recommendations to Corzine on how to integrate illegal immigrants into the state's community.

The panel chairman would not comment on what those recommendations are until the governor looks at them, but reports in The Bergen Record indicate one may be for driver's privilege cards that would let illegal immigrants legally drive, and another would provide in-state tuition for immigrants seeking higher education.

"That seems to me the height of insanity," said state Sen. Christopher J. Connors, who issued a joint statement Friday with Assemblymen Brian E. Rumpf and Daniel M. Van Pelt, all R-Ocean, Burlington, Atlantic. "It defies, to me, any logic."

The legislators said issuing driver's identification cards to illegal immigrants would undermine strict security measures for obtaining IDs, and that giving them access to in-state tuition would increase the cost for legal residents.

The delegation also touted legislation it recently introduced to exclude illegal immigrants from receiving workers' compensation or temporary disability benefits, and it pointed to its opposition of a failed effort several years to issue illegal immigrants driver's IDs.

Supporters of the driver's privilege cards and tuition arrangement say immigrants are vital to the state's economy and these efforts would integrate them into New Jersey society. Supporters also say IDs would enable illegal immigrants to get car insurance, which many lack - making accidents more dangerous and costly for legal drivers.

But Connors rejected those arguments, saying the moves would support illegal immigration.

"So, in other words, we should condone illegal activity when it drives the economy," he said. "That's just the wrong message."

Connors said any recommendations - if they include driver's privilege cards or allowances for in-state tuition to unlawful immigrants - likely would have to be implemented through a legislative process.

"My suspicion is if it gets to that point, there would be such a hue and cry from the public that it would not get the required votes," he said.

Instead, Connors said, federal immigration policy needs to be reformed. However, frustration with national reform is what led to Corzine's creation of the panel in 2007, which worked on its recommendations for more than a year before issuing its final report Tuesday.

Corzine is expected to review the report's recommendations within a week.

E-mail Lee Procida:

LProcida@pressofac.com
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