Undocumented individuals in California, including those in the UCLA community, will soon be able to legally share the road with other drivers.
Gov. Jerry Brown officially signed a measure into law last week that allows undocumented individuals to apply for a driver’s license starting in 2015.
“This is only the first step,” Brown said in a speech after signing the bill. “When a million people without their documents drive legally and with respect in the state of California, the rest of this country will have to stand up and take notice.”
Ingrid Eagly, UCLA law professor researching immigration law, said California has been passing policies to integrate undocumented individuals in society, while the federal government has not been able to pass immigration reform.
The Department of Motor Vehicles said in a statement that it will need to prepare applications for an estimated 1.4 million undocumented individuals who are eligible to apply for the license under the new law.
Eagly said the new law will help increase public safety since undocumented drivers will have to learn official driving rules and take driving tests.
“California is making a positive step forward by allowing all state residents, regardless of immigration status, to obtain a license,” Eagly said.
Blanca Villagomez, a third-year sociology student, said her father is afraid of being pulled over and deported when he drives because he is undocumented.
“(Being pulled over) is definitely one of the biggest fears we have,” Villagomez said.
Because there was a traffic checkpoint on the way to UCLA that could have caught her father driving without a license, Villagomez said she and her father had to wait a day before moving into her apartment.
She said her undocumented parents no longer have to be afraid of being caught when her father drives her to UCLA.
“The fear they get everytime they’re in a car is now gone,” Villagomez said.
Villagomez qualified for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which was implemented last year by University of California President Janet Napolitano, then-secretary of homeland security. The policy allows undocumented individuals like Villagomez to live and work in the U.S. if they meet certain criteria.
California already allows deferred action individuals to receive a driver’s license.
Francisco Lopez, a fourth-year Chicana/o studies student who qualifies for deferred action, said that although he does not directly benefit from the law, he can take comfort that the law will bring relief to his family.
“It won’t make (undocumented individuals) be afraid of being stopped when taking their children to school,” Lopez said. “It is huge to recognize these people’s rights.”
The law, however, requires the state to create a different design for the new licenses, and recommends labeling the licenses DP for “driving privilege” instead of DL for “driver’s license.” Opponents cite this requirement will have many unintended consequences.
Immigrant rights advocates are concerned because the immediate distinction of a person’s legal status can still open the opportunity for discrimination, Eagly said.
“I was angry about the ‘driving privilege’ title because people can immediately look at us in a different light,” Villagomez said.
Others opposed to the bill, including Republican Assemblyman Tim Donnelly of California’s 33rd District, believe the special designation on the license will cause problems with employers.
Donnelly argues that businesses will be in conflict with following either federal law or state law because the special designation will reveal an individual’s legal status. Federal law prohibits employers from hiring undocumented individuals, but the new law stipulates that businesses cannot deny employment solely on the license.
“It’s not just a license for (undocumented individuals) to drive,” Donnelly said in a statement. “It’s a license to sue potential employers.”
The new law stipulates that law enforcement also cannot use the license as a reason for arrest, detainment, criminal investigations or discrimination.
Soon after the new law was signed, the state passed another law in favor of immigrant rights advocates.
Last week, Gov. Brown also signed the Trust Act into law, which limits how long local law enforcement can detain undocumented individuals who commit minor offenses alone, preventing them from being turned in to federal immigration officials for deportation.
Wow, this has gotta be the first time I’ve ever seen the Bruin post something about undocumented people and there are no racist comments piling up down here. At least that’s progress of some sort, though “not being racist” is hardly a phenomenal achievement.
I don’t know if this is racist or not, and I am neither trying to be, nor trying not to be. I don’t think these are issues of race, but about money and ideology and culture. The only reason for any discussion to become “racist” is when we believe as an underlying premise, that genes contain within them an inherent nature that determine ideology and, even culture. But if we believe that culture is merely coincidental, and determined by the environment (climate, available resources, and other geographical qualities), then we can still discuss culture and contextual difficulties, without involving inherent traits via genetics. Being “undocumented” is a political, cultural, and ideological concern — not a racist one. Necessarily expecting a genetic/biological issue to be raised, when what has been presented can be strictly debated from a political, cultural, and ideological perspective, seems to me to be biased, loaded, and even a little misinformed.
A few points/complaints I want to voice:
#1. Currently, I think there are too many gas-powered cars on the streets. I think this makes a lot of pollution, because the air doesn’t smell to great. I don’t like “clean-air” public transportation, because that is also fueled by harmful methods like “fracking”. I think solar-powered and electric hybrids, with reduced speeds are the long-term solution.
#2. People often want solutions to come from heaven, or from “prince charming” like Cinderella. I think this is harmful thinking, because unless we realize that change begins with us ourselves, we will always be living like locusts — those who consume the benefits of a region, and move on to prey on other healthy regions. For this reason, I am against Christianity and Catholicism, but I digress. The point is, that there is no after-life, so it becomes even more important to realize that if we want a better world, we must make this better world with our own hands NOW.
#3. I think too many people prefer “cheap” goods, and this adds to more pollution, and this in turn leads to a more hostile society in general –where wealthy people become hostile to poorer folk who give their dollar-votes to inhumane and inferior standards and so come to despise them, and poorer folk become hostile to wealthy folk for having elitist standards which only the wealthy can afford to live by and so come to hate any structure that seems to perpetuate the hegemonic system of the powerful and wealthy. I think the solution here, is for both parties to try to understand the bigger picture, before engaging in daily activities. Opportunity is not enough. Education is critical. The innocent bystander that gets shot, is justice. I also think that the first offensive move has to come (ironically) from the poorer folk, who have to remove the moral concern that makes wealthy folk despise the poor. Make homespun goods; if we really want to impact the wealthy and change the economic system, CONSUME LESS MANUFACTURED GOODS.
#4. Private property can be a good thing. Think about it.
#5. That said, the entire earth is a large biome. Ultimately, it is ONE habitat, not many. And, it is an eco-SYSTEM. There are niches within the whole, but the parts have to fit with each other — and that is why the earth is still, a system.
#6. Don’t give in to brute force. What I mean by that, is to not give in to the materialistic, “modern” way of thinking that sometimes may seem to afford people a higher standard of living, or a better way of life. Believe in the old wisdoms of ancient traditions (I am speaking of pre-christian traditions), and fight with wisdom, not brute force. The goal, I think, is to fight towards the “good”, not merely to “win”. I guess the question I want to ask is, whether the end we lend our efforts to will merely change WHO is put WHERE on the hierarchical picture, or whether we want to change the hierarchical system to something else altogether?
My final (revolutionary) thoughts: For me, mercy is swiftness, not leniency. A long life of mediocrity and complaisance is equivalent to the life of slavery for me. I live to touch the sublime, and to experience perfection from the unique perspective of a mortal being. If I do not strive for excellence, virtue, beauty, strength, and understanding with every fiber of my being, then I am not human. I would rather live a moment than to live an eternity, if the moment is the only way that I can join those others whom I long to call “brother” and “sister” or “father” and “mother”, or “daughter” and “son”. What does “race” have to do with this at all? What “phenomenal achievement” are you referring to? To be a Bruin, is to be beyond “race”. Change begins inside.