William R. Richardson: “this is an issue of civil liberties and personal privacy. We do not need big brother to keep track of our citizens, and…”

“this is an issue of civil liberties and personal privacy. We do not need big brother to keep track of our citizens, and this is what we are doing with a national ID system. If you are blond and fair-skinned, you are not going to be asked to provide an identity. But if you are a member of the congressional Hispanic or Black or Asian Caucus, you probably are. This is the nub of this argument. People whose accent, appearance, or family background make them look like foreigners would be screened out of jobs as employers attempt to avoid the inevitable problems which this verification process would cause. Why would an employer bother to hire somebody that, quote, looks foreign? What makes everybody think that this system is going to work? I have heard Members on both sides rail about the inefficiency of Government, the IRS, IRS computers and verification system, that we are creating a gigantic bureaucracy. Yet for some reason many on that side and on our side think that it is going to work. This is a case of personal privacy. This is a case of civil liberties. All Americans recognize that illegal immigration is a problem, but a solution to this problem is not the creation of a database of unprecedented scope that invades the privacy of all our citizens and requires employers to ask the Government's permission before they make hiring decisions. Business people should not be bureaucrats and INS officers. This is what we are doing.”