GIL CEDILLO
The state senator and longtime labor activist on the battle for drivers' licenses for undocumented w
By Perry Crowe
Democratic State Senator Gil Cedillo has proposed several laws that license California's drivers without distinguishing so-called "illegal" immigrants from others. But there was a time that Cedillo's efforts were unnecessary. But during the administration of Republican Governor Pete Wilson, conservatives began playing on fears that state licenses would allow undocumented workers to obtain social services and other benefits that citizens and workers with legal immigration status receive.
The face-off has continued ever since, and Cedillo has fought efforts to connect genuine issues of safety on California highways to the immigration status of individual applicants. On Monday, June 27, the State Traffic Commission sent SB60 to its last fiscal committee, further up the road toward the Governor's desk. That, of course, is where it might run into serious trouble - which is a place Sen. Cedillo is familiar with.
CityBeat: Governor Schwarzenegger had earlier asked you to make licenses for illegal immigrants visibly different from others, and you said no. Why the change in attitude now?
State Senator Gil Cedillo: My attitude hasn't changed. What's changed is the political reality. We do not have an option. If we want to provide an opportunity for all immigrants to drive legally, this is the only way to do it. It's going to happen now, regardless.
What is the basis of opposition to the bill?
The governor in the past argued it was related to national security. At the same time, we've had strong support from the law enforcement community during the entire time we've been working on this. Every police chief during this period has supported us. It's very interesting. Republicans say that their principal concern has to do with the question of people complying with the law. My problem with that is the lack of consistency. They'll give a license to a person with DUIs [Driving Under the Influence]. They'll give a license to someone who uses a car in the commission of a bank robbery. So these people break the law, but [the state doesn't] have a problem with giving them a license.
You won't give it to an immigrant who is waiting to have their immigrant status adjudicated so that they can take their son to chemotherapy treatments, but you'll give a license freely to a person who molests children so that they can use that car to cruise around parks and schools and malls where children congregate.
What about the argument from the governor's people who say this bill is premature, since they need to wait and see what the enforcement of the Federal Real ID Act is actually going to mean for the states?
I think it's dilatory on the governor's part. It's irresponsible and I think it's pretty obvious that he has failed again and he's failing to honor his word. His word was, if we worked with him after we repealed the bill, then we would get another counter-proposal. Then he changed his position. First he said he wanted a license for all immigrants. And then he changed his mind and said, "I want one, but it has to have a distinguished mark." He never gave us anything in writing. If you look at his veto letter, it was only four sentences and it didn't talk about a mark. And so, the governor says a lot of things, but they're always changing depending on what time it is.
You've stated that it's up to the individual whether illegal immigrants choose to get a license or just continue to drive illegally. What's the point of driving legally if your very presence in the country is technically illegal?
[The illegal immigrants'] motivation is they want to drive legally. Their motivation is they don't want their car taken away from them if they get stopped. Their motivation is they want to have insurance should they be hit. Or if they hit someone, they don't have to run and flee. They can have an opportunity to respond with an insurance company. What I hear from the immigrant community is they want the license because they're tired of being stopped, they're tired of looking over their shoulder, they're tired of having their car removed from them without due process or just cause.
When these illegal immigrants register for drivers' licenses, aren't they essentially compiling a database of illegal immigrants? Couldn't the INS use the list of licensed illegal immigrants as a map to find illegal immigrants?
Those aspects will be adjusted as the bill moves forward. There were provisions in our previous proposal of SB60. Of course, that was vetoed.
And this bill was big with your wife, right?
My wife was awesome. She cared a lot about young people and youth. Both of us grew up in kind of modest backgrounds. So she thought it was unfair to make children victims of immigration. It was wrong for children who are accompanying their parents to places, and then their parents' car gets pulled over and they're left on the sidewalk.
If you get pulled over without ID and without insurance, they impound your car?
That's the law. Thirty-day hold. No discretion. None whatsoever.
And that's where this bill came from?
Those incidents were the ones that were brought to my attention. And our first efforts were simply to reduce the fine so that it wouldn't be such a burden because the fine was more than the value of the car. [My office] simply tried to get that reduced and get some of the penalties taken off. And then the next year we said why are we dealing with the symptom? What we really need to do is get licenses to everybody again. Because this was the law for 65 years. It worked. People changed the law [in 1994, requiring applicants for California drivers' licenses to be legal citizens] thinking it would have an impact on immigration. It had no impact on immigration. And so I said, well, this is silly because all we're doing is making our highways less safe because we don't like the fact that immigration doesn't work, so we made a law that doesn't work either, and somehow makes us feel good.
Published: 06/30/2005
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