California is on the verge of allowing hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants to receive driver's licenses for the first time in nearly two decades.
The key question is how to do it.
The issue of granting driver's licenses to undocumented immigrants has raged in the Legislature for much of the past decade, without resolution, but fighting is largely moot now due to a new federal policy.
President Barack Obama's Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals gives a select group of undocumented immigrants the right to live and work in the United States for two years without fear of deportation.
California is laying the groundwork for extending the privilege to driving, too, for an estimated 400,000 immigrants.
"It appears that young people who receive federal deferrals will be eligible for California driver's licenses," the Department of Motor Vehicles said in a written statement Tuesday.
"But it remains uncertain whether clarifying legislation or regulations will be necessary," the DMV statement said.
Gil Duran, spokesman for Gov. Jerry Brown, said the DMV statement reflects the governor's position but that he could not elaborate.
The glitch is that state regulations allow only certain types of federal immigration documents to support the issuance of a driver's license.
If President Obama's Deferred Action program provides participants with "new or different immigration documents," then legislation or regulatory clarification may be needed, the DMV said.
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