Arizona Sheriff: Driver's Licenses For Immigrants 'Has Now Become A Right'
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (CBS Sacramento/AP) — California received nearly a half-million applications for driver's licenses from immigrants in the country illegally in the three months since a new law took effect.
Department of Motor Vehicles Director Jean Shiomoto said in a statement that the figure shows far higher demand than the DMV expected. She said the agency thought it would take twice as long to get so many applications.
Pinal County, Arizona, Sheriff Paul Babeu told Fox News on Monday that law enforcement across the country are worried about immigrants receiving driver's licenses.
"[A]s a way to incentivize all these illegals to come and apply for this driver's license, and they expect over 90 percent of all the illegals to do this, is they ease their fears saying they will not share any of the data, any of the personal information about the person coming forward with any other government agency. That should be alarming to all of us," Babeu said.
Babeu added that driver's licenses for immigrants are becoming "a right."
"What they need to provide is one of three documents -- either a passport, a consular matricula card, or an elections card. Now, the 20 million illegals who are here, next to none of them have a passport, which we all see as a trusted document," Babeu told Fox News. "But these other documents are proven you don't need to — in order to get that document -- you don't really have to do anything. You just show up and ask for one, essentially. And so if we're using this document to now get a U.S. government-issued ID that used to be a privilege... this has now become a right or an expectation for all these illegals now under Obama to say, hey, this is their right to have a license issued, not a privilege as it always has been."
The DMV said in the figures released Friday that of the about 494,000 applications already received, about 203,000 licenses have been granted and about 245,000 more are expected to be granted.
AB60, signed into law by Gov. Jerry Brown, allows people in the country illegally to obtain driver's licenses with identification from their home countries.
(TM and © Copyright 2015 CBS Radio Inc. and its relevant subsidiaries. CBS RADIO and EYE Logo TM and Copyright 2015 CBS Broadcasting Inc. Used under license. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
