An editorial in today's Washington Examiner criticizes CASA of Maryland for handing out "more than 10,000 'identification cards' to immigrants in Montgomery County without even so much as requiring proof of residency," arguing that this is an invitation to fraud because the IDs ostensibly have no legal force, can be used to obtain public benefits illegally, and are an invitation to terrorists to enter the U.S. to kill Americans.
This is some pretty heavy stuff and not altogether without merit. However, I don't believe for a minute that an ID card -- especially one supposedly lacking legal standing -- invites any more fraudulent behavior than the actual programs it's apparently being used to exploit.
Before continuing on, I should disclose that I am a paid contributor to the Washington Examiner (and, of course, I trust this article won’t change that!). I have a great professional and personal respect for Mark Tapscott, the paper's editorial page editor, and this critique is intended to be nothing but polite disagreement with the editors' collective opinion. Indeed, immigration is one of the most divisive issues in the country today, and I simply hope to further the debate.
That said, let's take a few points in the article one at a time, shall we?
Why does CASA — which is partially funded by Montgomery County’s government — hand out IDs that look official but have no legal force? Because, as CASA officials freely admit, the cards are used to bypass federal homeland security rules requiring proof of identity for banking transactions.
This argument appears to be largely moot. For one thing, if a bank wants to let someone open an account with, say, a Blockbuster card and an old college ID, that's its prerogative. In other words, if a bank allows its customers to conduct business without a "legal" ID, it hardly matters what kind it is. Not to mention, I've never been to a bank that's let me process any transaction without at least first showing a valid driver's license. So, if a bank considers a CASA ID a valid form of identification, why the opposition? Are we saying immigrants should be forced to keep their earnings in the safe confines of a pillow case at home?
Moreover, if the federal government reserves the right to regulate banks and determine which types of identification are suitable for banking transactions, it stands to reason that it could simultaneously impose its force to nullify the validity of the CASA ID. Such an imposition would necessarily render my own arguments moot as well, because if banks were slapped with these burdensome federal regulations, clearly they would not be the final arbiter of acceptable identification policy in the first place. Therefore, if the state is not going to invalidate the use of CASA IDs for banking, can we not assume that these documents carry at least some legal weight?
The spurious IDs issued by CASA are also used to evade county-required proof of residency to enroll children in school or ... obtain public benefits illegally.
If immigrants are indeed collecting welfare benefits, whether by attending public schools or receiving food stamps and other taxpayer-provided subsidies, this can hardly be blamed on the type of ID card used to collect them. In short, welfare services are a problem of socialism, not of "spurious" identification documents. If people are invited to suckle at the government teat, we shouldn't be surprised when Americans and foreigners alike come looking for a handout.
And what of the claim that these public benefits are obtained "illegally" with the CASA card? I would argue that benefits obtained with any legal government ID are benefits obtained illegally, given that the state has already acted immorally in confiscating our property in the form of income and property taxes, which it in turn redistributes to other people. This is theft, plain and simple, and the last time I checked, theft was illegal. Apparently not so when committed by altruistic politicians, however.
Nevertheless, if the state of Maryland or Montgomery County wished to invalidate the CASA ID as a means of proving identity, one would think it could easily issue a directive doing so.
Worst of all, these counterfeit IDs are an open invitation to terrorists who want to enter this country to kill Americans. It was only six years ago that Sept. 11 terrorists used state-issued driver’s licenses while preparing their murderous plot.
I admit I'm confused by this logic. First, the CASA ID is not exactly counterfeit. It indeed may not carry the same legal status as a passport or driver’s license, but CASA is upfront about its use as its ID card. I could create a perfectly legitimate photo ID at home tonight and use it as identification; whether particular public or private agencies would accept it as a valid form of identification is up to them.
Furthermore, all nineteen 9/11 hijackers possessed some form of legal identification. Indeed, as the editors admit, many if not all of them were able to procure state-issued driver's licenses. So if the feds and state governments across the country can't prevent terrorists from getting valid driver's licenses, does it really matter if terrorists could also get a CASA card? Guess which one they'll be waving around airport security in the event they want to hijack another plane.
Could a CASA card be used to commit fraud, as the Examiner editors warn? Of course. But so could any identification card, whether it's a legal government document or not. As we know, the 9/11 terrorists used state-sanctioned IDs, but IDs that can be created lawfully can also be faked. If nothing else, we should be able to admit that identification cards generally provide a false sense of security.
Given these arguments, it's not hard to believe the case against the CASA card is being used as little more than a red herring, an attempt to discredit immigration itself by cultivating fear that our "illegal" immigrants will be the next coming of Mohammad Atta. However, what many people seem to forget is that the 9/11 murderers were in the U.S. legally.
In short, it's a stretch to argue that immigrants who fail to obtain legal government documentation could do as much harm as a terrorist who plays by the rules, thereby avoiding the scrutiny invited by the failure to possess a legal ID. Surely the Examiner's editors are not arguing that federally regulated airlines will accept the CASA card as proof of identification for boarding purposes. After all, they specifically note that the card isn't even a legal document.
Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of the immigration debate is our habit of identifying so-called undocumented workers as "illegal" immigrants in the first place. This is to assume that the very act of travel itself is illegal. If a person inflicts no physical harm upon another when he walks across the street, hence committing no crime, how can he theoretically be considered a criminal simply for choosing to walk across the border of a country? A state that visits violence upon immigrants who initiate no violence is acting immorally, and must therefore be considered guilty of criminal activity itself.
Moreover, is it not the slightest bit absurd to imply that workers, who come to the U.S. to provide services that are clearly in demand, are unwelcome simply because a handful might turn out to be violent criminals? By this rationale, why are children born on U.S. soil automatically granted citizenship? Certainly a percentage will grow up to exhibit criminal behavior. Crime is illegal; the potential to commit it, however, is not.
Clearly it is not illogical to take measures to protect ourselves from those who would do us harm. However, the U.S. government had the tools in place to prevent the 9/11 attacks and it failed to do so. Immigration opponents reasonably argue that open borders are incompatible with a welfare state, but they nevertheless empower the state to administer government subsidies that encourage many outsiders to flood the borders to begin with. And let’s not forget the one point that somehow goes unmentioned in most circles: Undocumented aliens are streaming into the country every day, but we’re hardly presented with a terrorist crisis because of it.
The common denominator in the immigration debate debate and our potential safety as a nation is the state. The government passes laws it refuses to enforce, yet we wonder why immigrants are content to shun them. It enacts laughable "security" measures in airports, yet we believe that forcing travelers to toss bottled water and lipstick before boarding a plane will "keep us safe." We think that by giving the federal government even more ability to track and monitor us, we will prevent terrorist attacks, even though we already know that the worst attacks in U.S. history were carried out by perpetrators who essentially followed the letter of the law while they traveled around the country.
Perhaps it's time to stop worrying less about immigrants who come here to better themselves, and start worrying more about an increasingly tyrannical federal government that continually stokes fears of terrorism as an excuse to invade our privacy, keep us disarmed, tax us to death, and spend our money to grow the American empire. As it stands today, I fear my government much more than I fear a terrorist attack.
