According to a San Jose Mercury News report on October 3 “Gov. Jerry Brown Thursday signed legislation that restores the privilege of obtaining driver’s licenses by illegal immigrants” and the reason why Governor Brown passed this legislation, according to Mercury News, is because this “bill will make California’s roadways safer by requiring that newly licensed motorists obtain insurance and take roadway safety courses.”
Now, that may be the case and the case may be that California is looking to create even more revenue from those road tests illegal immigrants will have to take, more revenue from all of those licensing fee illegal immigrants will have to pay and quite possibly even more revenue from the sale of all of the vehicles by said illegal immigrants can now buy without scrunity, but could be there also be another reason?
Quite possibly, especially if one happens to read the Affordable Care Act (ACA), the signature bill by President Obama.
On page 66 of the ACA it clearly states that health coverage will be available to any individual who is “reasonably expected to be for the entire period for which enrollment is sought, a citizen or national of the United States or an alien lawfully present in the United States.”
With a valid driver’s license from a State an illegal immigrant could easily be considered “an alien lawfully present in the United States”.
This one act could quite possibly lead to granting the roughly 2.5 million illegal immigrants in California access to that State’s Health Care Exchange, thus leading to even more revenue to California while placing an even higher strain on a healthcare system that is already at a critical point.
To be clear: this may be just one of the many reasons why Governor Brown passed this ground breaking legislation, and if it is one of the reasons it will, intended or not, pave the way to even more people accessing healthcare in that State.