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Once again, I find myself in the middle of one of our most contentious issues: what to do about the 2003 law that permits the issuing of driver’s licenses to foreign nationals who cannot verify their legal status in New Mexico.
I believe that even the fiercest opponents would concede that the law’s public safety intent was legitimate: to provide the ability for foreign nationals to obtain car insurance, and in the process reduce one of the nation’s highest uninsured motorist rates, as well as make sure that these same individuals were in a databank that could be used by law enforcement officials.
But we obviously have a major problem with people taking advantage of this well-intended law, as documented in media accounts and through firsthand anecdotes from my District 15 constituents. Individuals can come to New Mexico to obtain licenses under fraudulent means, and then leave the state or traffic in these bogus documents. It is a problem of fraud, and it needs to be stopped.
Last week, I introduced House Bill 171, which repeals the 2003 law and substitutes a provisional license for foreign nationals who do not have a Social Security number. My proposed legislation is, in fact, very similar to the provisional license bill recently implemented in Utah.
With this license, people can still secure car insurance and lawfully drive themselves to work, or to church, or to school to pick up their children. It cannot, however, be used outside of New Mexico – this license would have no validity outside of our state borders. Thus, the fraud problem is immediately solved.
Let us now talk politics, as this is really how the issue is playing out. A variation of this provisional license approach has even been introduced over the past two sessions by three of my House Republican colleagues, who like many of us, want simply to solve this problem and move on to many other important issues. Yet Gov. Susana Martinez adamantly opposes the approach and has promised to veto such a compromise. She is quoted as saying that “74 percent of New Mexicans support my bill to repeal the current license law.” I would suggest that she is wrong, that 74 percent of New Mexicans want this problem solved, effectively and immediately.
I have walked my district, addressed neighborhood meetings and answered emails and phone calls. When I explain my opposition to the severely flawed, Arizona-style solution to this problem, the average voter understands that I, as a legislator, can only vote “yes” or “no” on the bill in front of me. The details matter, and ultimately I am forced to vote on the text of a bill rather than its intent. The current Martinez-backed bill before us, House Bill 103, sponsored by state Rep. Andy Nunez, is bad legislation. It completely ignores the problem that we are trying to solve – what to do about the roughly 85,000 foreign nationals in our state who would not qualify for any kind of legitimate driving under the criteria it proposes. In addition, it remains an open question whether it would bring us into compliance with the Real ID Act, which only a handful of states have chosen to pursue. It does not acknowledge that a driver’s license is not an invitation to citizenship – rather, it is an obligation that we insist upon as a community for our own public safety.
I am troubled by the complete absence of any willingness on Martinez’s end to compromise on this important issue. How can we govern effectively without compromise? Our constituents do not want issues like these used for political gain – they want meaningful dialogue and resolutions for problems, which means that we all have to make concessions.
I urge both sides – immigrant rights activists as well as Republican opponents – to tackle the problem with true compromise in the interest of good public policy for all New Mexicans.
