Spitz Can’t Catch a Break

License plan a political blunder

Rochester Turning has extensive coverage of the ridiculously tacky and nonsensical mailings being sent out by Monroe County Republicans taking aim at NYS Governor Eliot Spitzer’s drivers licensing plan for undocumented, and yes technically illegal, immigrants.

Republican Monroe County DMV head Cheryl Dinolfo wants to take Spitz to court.

And there is one other group that has come forward in opposition to the Gov’s idea: advocates for undocumented immigrants.

Governor Spitzer held an invitation only press conference yesterday with the Independent Press Association (IPA) of New York, a group which covers the ethnic media and immigrants’ issues.

The IPA reported on the 29th of October that immigrant leaders believed Spitz had turned his back on them with his sudden alteration of the license plan the Saturday before. Apparently the original form of Spitz’ license plan had been in the works since Day One of his administration:

A driver’s license that identifies its owner as an undocumented immigrant will lead to discrimination, racial profiling, and consequently deportation, according to dozens of members of pro-immigrant organizations during a protest on October 28 in front of New York Governor Eliot Spitzer’s office in Manhattan.

Javier Valdés of the New York Immigration Coalition said that he was protesting because the governor, after 10 months of negotiating “in good faith” with immigrant organizations to improve the life of undocumented immigrants

-snip-

Spitzer, in reaction to the protest outside his office, said by telephone that he always said that he would comply with federal norms established by the Real ID Act, designed to keep undocumented immigrants or terrorists from obtaining drivers’ licenses.

So now Spitz is using the same rhetoric as the Monroe County GOP? And since when does the Governor give a damn about Federal statutes, this is the same guy who is taking the Bush Administration to court over SCHIP:

For Teresa Arieta, of the del Cuzcatlán Hispanic Center, with the change of plans, the governor “is placing us in a third category. A week ago he said that he was going to bring all the immigrants out of the shadows, giving them licenses, and he didn’t say that it was going to be in the three categories that he’s saying now,” said Arieta.

Guillermo Chacón, of the Nacional Salvadorean American Network, said that the license announced on Saturday by the governor “is a kind of apartheid, because what person is going to solicit a license that identifies him as undocumented?”

Ah – yes. “Here, officer, is my official document that clearly establishes me as undocumented.”

Udi Ofer, of the New York Civil Liberties Union, said that, with the new plan, “Governor Spitzer is resuscitating a piece of legisaltion (the Real ID Act) that has been described universally by many people as anti-American, anti-civil liberties, and anti-immigrant.”

Sound familiar?

from RochesterTurning