My View: Brown should uphold driving mandate

Six months ago, via the Measure 88 referendum, Oregon voters delivered a clear mandate: Foreigners here illegally shall not have driving privileges in our state. Now, newly installed Gov. Kate Brown must defend that mandate — even if courts ultimately uphold President Obama’s executive action offering work permits and deferred deportation to some 4 million illegal immigrants.

Here’s how the story has unfolded:

In spring 2013, the Legislature passed and Gov. John Kitzhaber signed Senate Bill 833, which enabled illegal immigrants to apply for four-year driver cards. Immediately, a group of citizens led by Oregonians for Immigration Reform launched an effort to refer SB 833 to the next general-election ballot.

By October 2013, OFIR had achieved its goal, securing the requisite 58,000-plus signatures of registered Oregon voters. A little more than a year later, Oregonians validated OFIR’s campaign and rejected illegal-immigrant driver cards by a 983,576-to-506,751 — or nearly 2-1 — margin.

Days after the election, however, Obama’s executive action opened the door for states to offer driving privileges to many illegal immigrants. “The threshold for [driving privileges in] most states,” notes Tanya Broder of the National Immigration Law Center, “is lawful or authorized presence in the United States, and usually one of the documents that states accept is a work authorization document” — which Obama’s action would provide its beneficiaries.

In February, however, shortly before it was scheduled to take effect, U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen enjoined Obama’s action. Immediately, the administration appealed Hanen’s injunction to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court. If that court affirms the injunction — and is upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court — Oregon voters’ mandate against illegal-immigrant driving privileges will stand. But if either of the higher courts overturns the injunction, Brown will be empowered to offer those privileges to illegal immigrants in Oregon affected by Obama’s action — who, the Migration Policy Institute estimates, may number 64,000.

Forty-five states, reports the Federation for American Immigration Reform, accept federally issued work permits as proof of lawful presence. In those states, however, citizens have not had the chance to vote directly on illegal-immigrant driving privileges. In Oregon, via Measure 88, they have — and have said, overwhelmingly, no. It is only right that the citizens’ judgment — not a dubious “lawful presence” conferred by the executive fiat of one man — guide official Oregon policy on driving and illegal immigrants.

Brown, state Senate president Peter Courtney told The Oregonian newspaper recently, is “a statewide elected official. She thinks statewide, and she’s capable of understanding the whole state.” If so, she’s capable of understanding this: Last November, the state voted to deny driving privileges to illegal immigrants. Oregonians should contact Brown (oregon.gov/gov/Pages/share-your-opinion.aspx) and urge her to announce that, no matter what courts decide about Obama’s executive action, she will defend that mandate and, in doing so, prove her respect for the will of the people she is sworn to serve.

Richard F. LaMountain, a former vice president of Oregonians for Immigration Reform, served as a chief petitioner of the 2014 referendum via which Oregon voters overturned the 2013 state law granting driver cards to illegal immigrants.