Minnesota Senate approves illegal immigrants to have driver's licenses

The Democrat-controlled Minnesota Senate passed a bill that would allow illegal immigrants the ability to obtain a U.S. driver's license. The project Driver's Licenses for All passed on a 34-31 vote, after several hours of discussion and attempts by Republicans to unsuccessfully add amendments to the bill, with the goal of noting that the licenses would only be good for driving and not for flying or voting.

"We have concerns with the ability for people to vote or do same-day registration once they have a photo ID," explained Lakeville Republican Rep. Jon Koznick when the bill passed the House by a 69-60 vote in January.

Minnesota Senator Glenn Gruenhagen also expressed concern about the possibility of terrorists coming to the state with the intention of obtaining a license and boarding an airline to commit an act of terrorism.

The bill would allow about 81,000 undocumented immigrants currently in Minnesota to qualify for a driver's license, but first the bill will head to Gov. Tim Walz' s desk for his signature.

California issued 1.2 million licenses to undocumented immigrants

According to data published by CalMatters, nearly 4 out of every 10 illegal immigrants in the state of California have obtained their driver's license due to the Safe and Responsible Drivers Act (AB 60) which began to be implemented in 2015 and eliminated the legal state residency requirement for licensure.

The data also reveals that about 1.2 million original AB60 permits have been issued to illegals and more than 822,000 renewals have been issued since the law began to be implemented. In addition to California and Minnesota, nearly 20 states have followed suit.