GOP Lawmakers Against 3-in-1 License

Prominent Republican legislators vowed Tuesday to fight Democratic Gov. Janet Napolitano's proposal for a new alternative driver license that could also be used to cross borders to verify eligibility for employment.

Two Senate leaders and the heads of key House and Senate committees were among seven legislators participating in a news conference to criticize the so-called ``3-in-1'' license proposal. Representatives of the American Civil Liberties Union and the John Birch Society also participated.

The lawmakers called the license proposal an ominous step toward compliance with Real ID, an emerging federal identification requirement that the lawmakers called an infringement on individual liberties and of state sovereignty.

The proposed alternative license would put the state on a track to requiring citizens to carry identification cards with embedded electronic features that could be used as tracking devices, said Republican Sen. Karen Johnson of Mesa, a leading critic of the license plan. ``I oppose making our driver license into an identity card.''

Johnson and other GOP lawmakers called the governor's Dec. 6 signing of an agreement with U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff on the alternative driver license the latest example of Napolitano's slighting of the Legislature's policy-making role.

``This is something that should be debated and should go through the legislative process,'' said Senate Majority Leader Thayer Verschoor, R-Gilbert.

Napolitano defended her initiative, calling it a realistic and appropriate means to provide enhanced identification for employment eligibility checks under the state's new employer sanctions law and meet tough new federal ID requirements to enter the United States from Canada and Mexico.

The 3-in-1 license would ``help meet real demands and real needs of Arizonans right now,'' she said Wednesday.

Napolitano acknowledged she needs legislative approval but downplayed the legislative opposition as ideologically driven.

``It certainly doesn't represent the majority of Arizonans,'' she said.

She argued that the new license itself would be voluntary and that people worried about their privacy could still get the standard license.

And while she said the license would comply with Real ID, the Real ID mandate hasn't been spelled out yet and Arizona and other states won't go along without federal funding, she said. ``Real ID is another animal.''

The license's embedded chip would not contain personal information other than a number, Napolitano said, and an authorized would use that number to access a Department of Public Safety database.

``To hack into it, you'd have to be able to hack into a law enforcement database,'' she said.

Rep. Judy Burges, a Skull Valley Republican who participated in the news conference, said she'll sponsor legislation next year to have Arizona refuse to participate in Real ID. The Senate passed similar legislation sponsored by Johnson in 2007 but the session ended without it being considered by the full House.

States that have rejected the federal ID Act include New Hampshire, Montana, South Carolina, Washington, Oklahoma and Main.

Washington is among three states that have license agreements like Arizona's with Homeland Security. New York and Vermont are the other two.