Editorial: New arrests show need for N.M. license reform

New Mexico’s ludicrous policy of handing out driver’s licenses to all comers regardless of immigration status continues to draw far-flung criminal enterprises. Ask the Guatemalans and Ecuadoreans arrested here last week.

That fact — in the past week eight individuals have been charged in alleged schemes to illegally obtain New Mexico driver’s licenses — should be front and center as legislators debate House Bill 606 today. The proposal, sponsored by freshman Rep. Paul Pacheco, R-Albuquerque, mirrors Senate Bill 521, sponsored by Senate Minority Leader Stuart Ingle, R-Portales, and Sen. John Arthur Smith, D-Deming.

The bills represent a compromise on wholesale repeal of the 2003 law that has the state handing out state-of-the-art, tamper-proof government identification complete with holograms and biometric facial recognition to individuals who are not supposed to have them under the federal Real ID Act.

Instead, the state Motor Vehicle Division would create what amounts to a driving permit for immigrants who were brought to the U.S. as children and have been granted deferred immigration enforcement action status by the federal government. It could not be used for identification outside of New Mexico. Citizens and legal immigrants would get a new license that complies with Real ID when their current one expires; illegal immigrants without a deferred action status would lose driving privileges.

Gov. Susana Martinez has said she supports the compromise. And several successful Democratic legislative candidates had expressed support for reforming the system while campaigning. So the right compromise should be able to garner bipartisan support.

HB 606 and SB 521 deserve serious consideration because they return government-vetted IDs to legal citizens and extend the privilege of driving to those who have deferred immigration enforcement action status.

And they take criminal license enterprises out of the equation.

This editorial first appeared in the Albuquerque Journal. It was written by members of the editorial board and is unsigned as it represents the opinion of the newspaper rather than the writers.