Green Lantern
March 25th, 2007, 9:03:27 PM
Mexican Consulate’s push for ID cards for
immigrants draws fire from legislator
Ashley Meeks
Record Staff Writer
Is Roswell poised to accept a Mexican Consulate-issued card as official identification?
El Paso, Texas, consulate officials, who visited Mayor Sam LaGrone recently, hope so. The Mexican Consulate is trying to encourage local city councils and county commissions to pass resolutions to accept the ID cards....
Consul General Juan Carlos Foncerrada said the “large population” of Mexican nationals who reside in this country are in need of consular identification cards, which gives them better access to basic medical care, banking, credit cards, and reporting crime.
“If they do not have a way of identifying themselves, they will not be reporting crimes to local authorities,” Foncerrada said. “If we want to have a safe community, we need to know who are our neighbors.”
Consulate officials visit Mexican nationals who can not get to El Paso or Albuquerque with a mobile consulate tour that provides the identification cards, often to crowds of around 500, Foncerrada said. The mobile consulate, which visited Roswell last October, is scheduled to return Nov. 17.
The consulate maintains that the ID has nothing to do with immigration.
“We don’t care if they are here legally or illegally,” Foncerrada said of the more than 600,000 American residents born in Mexico. “Many of our community spend some time here (and) have children that are U.S. citizens.”
Foncerrada said many of the consulate ID holders are in America legally anyway....
That’s not likely for State Sen. Rod Adair, R-Roswell, who said there was no need to create an identification card for illegal aliens.
“It does absolutely nothing other than ... confirm that you have Mexicans living in America illegally,” Adair said....
“The Mexican government does little other than promote lawlessness with regard to our national security,” Adair said. “All they want is relief from their own stagnant economy, which fails to produce the one million jobs a year that they need.”
Adair spent two years working in Venezuela and three years working in Honduras, and worked temporarily in 14 other countries with the military. He used his passport and his American drivers license to do everything the consular ID is touted as providing, and never needed an additional document, he said.
And he said he would seriously caution city leaders against promoting the consular ID.
“If the city council or the mayor goes along with that, that’s one of the goofiest things they could possibly do,” Adair said. “This carries it to the theater of the absurd.”
http://www.roswell-record.com/
immigrants draws fire from legislator
Ashley Meeks
Record Staff Writer
Is Roswell poised to accept a Mexican Consulate-issued card as official identification?
El Paso, Texas, consulate officials, who visited Mayor Sam LaGrone recently, hope so. The Mexican Consulate is trying to encourage local city councils and county commissions to pass resolutions to accept the ID cards....
Consul General Juan Carlos Foncerrada said the “large population” of Mexican nationals who reside in this country are in need of consular identification cards, which gives them better access to basic medical care, banking, credit cards, and reporting crime.
“If they do not have a way of identifying themselves, they will not be reporting crimes to local authorities,” Foncerrada said. “If we want to have a safe community, we need to know who are our neighbors.”
Consulate officials visit Mexican nationals who can not get to El Paso or Albuquerque with a mobile consulate tour that provides the identification cards, often to crowds of around 500, Foncerrada said. The mobile consulate, which visited Roswell last October, is scheduled to return Nov. 17.
The consulate maintains that the ID has nothing to do with immigration.
“We don’t care if they are here legally or illegally,” Foncerrada said of the more than 600,000 American residents born in Mexico. “Many of our community spend some time here (and) have children that are U.S. citizens.”
Foncerrada said many of the consulate ID holders are in America legally anyway....
That’s not likely for State Sen. Rod Adair, R-Roswell, who said there was no need to create an identification card for illegal aliens.
“It does absolutely nothing other than ... confirm that you have Mexicans living in America illegally,” Adair said....
“The Mexican government does little other than promote lawlessness with regard to our national security,” Adair said. “All they want is relief from their own stagnant economy, which fails to produce the one million jobs a year that they need.”
Adair spent two years working in Venezuela and three years working in Honduras, and worked temporarily in 14 other countries with the military. He used his passport and his American drivers license to do everything the consular ID is touted as providing, and never needed an additional document, he said.
And he said he would seriously caution city leaders against promoting the consular ID.
“If the city council or the mayor goes along with that, that’s one of the goofiest things they could possibly do,” Adair said. “This carries it to the theater of the absurd.”
http://www.roswell-record.com/