4 states provide federal citizenship with driver’s license information

Iowa, South Carolina and South Dakota have now joined Nebraska in agreeing to share driver's license information with the US Census Bureau to help US President Donald Trump's administration determine the citizenship status of every US resident. Writes about this ABC News.

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Until recently, Nebraska was the only state to sign an agreement with the Census Bureau for the exchange of information. Donald Trump last year ordered the bureau to collect citizenship data from administrative documents of federal and state institutions after the U.S. Supreme Court blocked an attempt to include citizenship in the 2020 census questionnaire.

The vast majority of states have refused to share information from driver's licenses and ID cards. The governors of the four cooperating states are Republicans.

Opponents of the collection of citizenship data fear that it will be used by states and local governments to change legislation in favor of only US citizens instead of the entire population. According to opponents, it would benefit Republicans and non-Hispanic whites.

Citizenship information in motoring agencies is generally unreliable, given that legitimate residents have no reason to notify them when they become citizens, said Thomas Saens, president and general adviser of the Mexican-American Legal Defense and Education Foundation (MALDEF).

MALDEF is one of several civil rights groups challenging Trump's order in federal court in Maryland.

“Their mission is to create a national database, so having three relatively small states providing them with records doesn't give them much scope for what they want to do. They need a nationwide database,” Saenz said. “I don’t know what this shows, except that if I visited one of these states, I would be angry that the state was releasing my information without my permission.”

The Commerce Department, which oversees the Census Bureau, says it has enough administrative data to determine citizenship for nearly 90% of the US population, and records collected after Trump’s decree will only fill in the remaining gaps.

The agreement with South Carolina was signed earlier in July. The Census Bureau pays South Carolina $27 for the data. South Carolina state law allows information to be shared if it is to perform “a lawful function of a government agency,” South Carolina Department of Motor Vehicles spokeswoman Julie Roy said in an email.

On the subject: Check yourself: can you pass the test for US citizenship

In April, South Dakota signed an agreement with the Census Bureau that the state must send monthly driver license information, including names, addresses, dates of birth, and citizenship status. Because proof of US citizenship or legal immigration status is required, South Dakota does not allow individuals in the country illegally to obtain a driver's license or ID.

The data must be used “solely for statistical purposes and not for programmatic or administrative enforcement purposes,” according to the agreement with South Dakota. Similar language is used in agreements with Iowa and South Carolina. These agreements restrict the Census Bureau from sharing data with other agencies.

The South Dakota Department of Security issued a statement saying that the state's driver's license program is "authorized to share information for use by any government agency in the performance of its functions."

Iowa began sending data to the Census Bureau in March. In Iowa, only citizens or residents can legally obtain a driver’s license or ID, so citizenship status is not included in his information.

Democrats have filed a law that repeals Trump’s decree on collecting citizenship data.

A census takes place once every ten years and helps to understand how federal expenditures in the amount of $ 1,5 trillion are distributed and how many seats in Congress each state gets.

Democrats say the attempt to collect citizenship information is part of the Trump administration's ongoing efforts to politicize the Census Bureau.

Many residents in immigrant communities have feared filling out the census form, and state agreements show Trump is trying to circumvent the Supreme Court’s decision, said Taniz Islam, an immigration lawyer who runs the Voice for Peace human rights organization.

“Many people are afraid to fill out government forms, and these agreements only increase mistrust,” Islam concluded.

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