To: / Chief Motor Vehicle Administrators
Chief Law Enforcement Officials /
FR: / Neil Schuster, President & CEO
DATE: / July 15, 2009
RE: / Senate Hearing on PASS ID
Earlier today the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs held a hearing on the proposed PASS ID legislation. The first panel witnesses were DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano and Governor Jim Douglas (VT) who is the incoming Chair of the National Governors Association (NGA). The second panel included David Quam from NGA along with privacy, law enforcement, and security advocates.
Much of the testimony and the questions that followed focused on the differences between REAL ID and PASS ID. Many framed the discussion that PASS ID is needed as a "fix" to REAL ID and maintained that even if the intent of REAL ID was valid, the reality is that it is not being implemented. Both Secretary Napolitano and Governor Douglas (on behalf of the nation's governors) expresses their full support for PASS ID and urged the committee to move quickly on it in light of the looming December 31 deadlines related to REAL ID compliance.
The committee members who attended (Senators Lieberman, Collins, Akaka, Voinovich, Tester, and Burris) were largely supportive of the proposed legislation. Some key points of concern that may result in changes to existing language include:
- Senator Lieberman's concern that removing the mandate for a state-to-state verification system creates a considerable security loophole. He did not suggest an alternative, but he was clear that he was not satisfied with just proceeding with the pilot.
- Senator Collins objection to language stating an individual shall not be denied boarding aircraft just because they do not have a compliant ID. She agrees there needs to be (like there already is) a secondary screening process in place, but she expressed a preference to a compliant ID being the standard ID for boarding aircraft. Collins expressed her views as both a security and state incentive issue.
The second panel of the hearing included a lot of discussion on privacy issues - particularly the protections of personally identifiable information (PII) and issues surrounding the machine readable zone of DL/ID cards. The privacy advocates are generally supportive of PASS ID but they are using this as the opportunity to provide privacy protections and restrictions on what is and is not allowed to be done with the machine readable portion of the card.
David Quam for the NGA made it clear to the committee that states are fully supportive of improving national security through an improved DL process, but that it needed to be a workable, realistic framework that reaps the benefits of investments already made towards REAL ID and provides certainty so all states - even those who have opposed REAL ID - could get back on-board and begin the process to implement PASS ID.
Attached is the full testimony by NGA. Additional testimony and hearing information can be found at the committee's website under the “Hearings” tab: