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A Tennessee lawmaker is proposing to highlight newcomers' immigration status by potentially stamping the word "ALIEN" on their driver's licenses.
Opponents say that would invite discrimination and discourage investment by foreign companies
In Tennessee, undocumented immigrants can't get a driver's license. And most legal residents only get a temporary one, timed to expire when their visas run out.
But state Rep. John Ragan, R-Oak Ridge, says their status should be made obvious. Their licenses should say ALIEN or NON U.S. CITIZEN in capital letters.
"Overwhelming numbers of people that come here don't intend to do us harm," he says. "But in this era, it doesn't take many. There was only 19 hijackers that killed 3,000 Americans on 9/11."
Ragan also cites the San Bernardino and Chattanooga shootings, though none of the attackers in those cases were temporary residents.
Stephanie Teatro of the Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition says highlighting legal immigrants' status in bold letters is mean-spirited. And, she adds, it'll hit immigrants that Tennessee has been trying to court.
"The people that are affected by this legislation are students, are visiting professors. They are executives from Nissan and Volkswagen," she says. "And so it really sends a pretty dangerous message to the global community."
Ragan's proposal has been filed as House Bill 222. State Sen. Ed Jackson, R-Jackson, is carrying the companion legislation, Senate Bill 272.
It's unclear whether any state requires temporary residents to be identified quite so boldly. Last year, Georgia considered a plan to stamp the licenses of undocumented immigrants that the Obama administration had allowed to stay in the country. But that measure was defeated.
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