Joho the Blog
An Entry from the Archives

And no one even notices.... really, really scary.

It's the legislation formerly known as HR 418, The Real ID Act. Passed by the House about 8 weeks ago, appended to the appropriations bill so that it would be forced through. Same legislation approached the 108th Congress last year as part of the bundle of changes to accommodate the 9/11 Commission's recommendations, but was stripped out due to objections. Heard through the grapevine that Sen. Tancredo (R-CO) was pushing this very, very hard; I'm told he's a bigot and would just as soon shut the borders altogether to keep out any non-whites, although the line is that it's all about security. Yeah. Right.

The problem is that once it passed the House, there was insufficient effort by the left to squash this piece of excrement passing for legislation. It's BAD. Very, very BAD. Should have had a full-court press but we were too preoccupied with Bush's DOA privatization plan, allowed ourselves to be distracted by this and stories about Jacko and runaway brides.

The essential problems with HR 418 as passed were that it:

- increased burdens on immigrants for documentation that will deter their seeking licenses, forcing them out of sight by the system and actually increasing security risks;

-- placed absurd requirements demanding asylum-seekers provide written documentation from their country of persecution in order to get a license;

And worst of all,

-- Homeland Security would be able to suspend ALL LAWS it felt impeded its job, WITHOUT JUDICIAL REVIEW.

That means NO CHECKS OR BALANCES ON DHS' POWER. No other governmental body has that kind of absolute power -- and you know what they say about absolute power corrupting absolutely.

IMPORTANT: I spoke with my Senator's office twice in the last week about this bill. They told me I was the ONLY other person that had called them, and the other person was self-identified as an immigrant who asked the Senator to support this bill. TO ANYBODY READING THIS: CALL YOUR SENATOR AND CONGRESSMAN NOW. YOU CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE IF YOU'RE THE ONLY ONE OF TWO CONSTITUENTS CALLING ABOUT THIS BILL.

Ask for sponsorship/co-sponsorship of an amendment to strip out the offensive portions of this legislation. If the amendment goes through the House your Congressman should contact Rep. Ron Paul of Texas to coordinate sponsorship; Rep. Paul may be a Republican, but he's a libertarian at heart and is disgusted with this bill.

Dave, if you're on the ground and not too jet-lagged, there's time to do something about the Real ID Act as of this morning -- but time is of the essence. Here's the Rapid Response Request I sent to all my fellow progressives in Michigan, asking them for help this morning:

>> BACKGROUND: This bill is apparently back up for a vote again; the Senate managed to keep out of the Iraq Appropriations Bill last week, but it's now attached to an Emergency Spending Bill [HR 1268] in order to railroad it through.

You can check the status at this site (actual text of this bill does not yet appear to be available in Thomas on line):

http://www.networklobby.org/issues/immigrant_id.html

There appears to be a Senate Amendment 395, sponsored by Senators Boxer, Clinton, Leahy, Lieberman (D) and Brownback, Alexander (R), asking that the text of the Real ID Act not be included in the conference report -- whatever that means. It's not clear to me that this amendment actually neutralizes the Real ID Act itself.

CALL YOUR SENATORS NOW -- it's too late for letters and emails are the last thing ever read. Tell them the Real ID Act is opposed by multiple church groups that care for immigrants who are victims of persecution overseas (including Church World Service and NETWORK-National Catholic Social Justice Lobby), by the ACLU, by the Arab-American Antidiscrimination Committee, by the National Council of La Raza, just for starters. YOUR CALL CAN AND WILL MAKE A DIFFERENCE -- I've talked with an aide in Senator Levin's office three times about this bill; only one other constituent has called Levin and that person called to encourage voting for the bill. Throw your personal political clout around and call your Senators now.

This legislation is another unfunded program as well, another financial burden that states cannot afford when they are already hard-pressed to provide healthcare and education for their residents. See Bruce Schneier's comments on this at: http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2005/05/real_id.html

Be sure to check that link at NETWORK above; it outlines the key objections to this bill, including permitting the overreaching the Dept. of Homeland Security -- without judicial recourse.

This is some of the worst legislation we could ever expect to see in our lifetime. Imagine, the Department of Homeland Security with no restraints on it, able to suspend any law without judicial review to protect whatever it deemed a border or barrier...absolutely frightening. More so since this bill has never been debated on the floor and probably never will be.

CONTACT INFO: Check http://www.congress.org/ for the local district office phone number for your state's Senators

ADDITIONAL ACTION:
If you have not written a Letter to the Editor of a local paper in the last 30 days and feel strongly about this bill, consider writing to local media and explaining that this bill is bad legislation, cite the reasons why, and ask why Congressman Dave Camp of the 4th Congressional District was a co-sponsor for the original legislation, House Bill 418, The Real ID Act, considering the numerous flaws in this legislation, its threat to democracy and its inability to provide real security.

If you are not in the 4th Congressional District, you may want to ask why Michigan Reps. Hoekstra, Miller, Rogers also co-sponsored this bill. Dave Camp is up for reelection, though, and pressing the point that his rubber stamping right-wing legislation does not serve Americans or their values may make in-roads on his approval rating before the election season.

To obtain contact information for local newspapers, go to the Media Center at Congress.org at http://www.congress.org/congressorg/dbq/media/?command=state_search&state=mi and select the newspapers closest to your home.

Thank you so much for any assistance you can offer on this Rapid Response Request

I am voting for smaller government, I am voting Libertarian to try and stop these unconstitutional laws from being passed.