Democratic State Rep. Bee Nguyen– also running for secretary of state— wants to grant driver’s licenses (“driver’s cards”) and state identification cards to Georgia’s estimated 400,000-plus illegal immigrants. She once introduced House Bill 833 in the General Assembly and, even though she’ll no longer be in the legislature, she hopes other Democrats will work to achieve the bill’s goal.
InsiderAdvantage has learned that she and other Democrats are also approaching key business leaders to try to widen support for this measure and other anti-immigration enforcement policies. But her opponent, incumbent Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, takes a strong stand against benefits to illegals and non-citizens voting.
Just exactly what was HB 833 — dubbed the “Freedom to Drive Act”– that Nguyen introduced and, interestingly, was co-sponsored by Democratic state Rep. William Boddie (now campaigning to be Georgia’s next labor commissioner).
First and foremost, it would have included commercial driver’s licenses for illegals– even though it is illegal to employ illegal aliens. The bill also would have permitted illegals to bring in phone bills, rent receipts and deportation-related papers to “prove” their identity and residence on applications for the bill’s proposed Georgia ID. And if the bill were ever to be passed into law, documents used by illegal immigrants on the application for ID and driving credentials could not be used for a state criminal investigation unless there was an order by a federal judge.
The liberal Georgia Budget and Policy Institute is a big cheerleader for such legislation and last year the Atlanta Journal-Constitution began promoting an aggressive sales campaign being conducted by advocacy groups.
As for Raffensperger, he has said that rewarding illegal behavior by officially blurring the lines between legal immigrants and illegal aliens isn’t fair or wise. And he warns that it certainly isn’t adding to our ballot security.
