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Civil rights group marks MLK Day with call for 'Trump card' national ID
A prominent civil rights group is marking Martin Luther King Jr. Day by pressing President Trump to honor his promise to create a national photo ID card for citizens.
Martin Luther King III, the oldest son of the iconic civil rights leader and a co-chairmen of the Drum Major Institute, met with Trump two years ago on MLK Day. During that meeting, the then president-elect endorsed the idea of a national photo ID. This year, the group is calling on Trump to follow through.
William Wachtel, co-founder of the Drum Major Institute, said the group sees the issue as critical to ensuring King's work to remove barriers to voting.
[...] The idea has invited controversy in the past, in particular over privacy concerns. In 2013, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) introduced a measure, the Protect Our Privacy Act, attached to a Senate immigration bill. The Paul amendment sought to prevent the creation of a national ID card, citing worries that it would make it easier for the government to track people. Wachtel sought to ease concerns about such an ID, saying it would not be mandatory and would only be an option for those who sought it.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by pipedwho on Tuesday January 22 2019, @03:58AM (2 children)
Even if it's not made mandatory by legislation, it may become de-facto so for anyone that wants to do anything of worth. For example if you're over 16/18/21/whatever and need to buy whatever product or visit whatever venues that have minimum age requirements, then the store/venue you may require your 'national ID' card be presented as proof of age. It may also become an easy requirement for anything else that currently requires some form of ID, like banking, credit applications, driver/gun/dog/fish licensing, student enrolment, etc. And as it becomes sufficiently ubiquitous, other players may start jumping in on the bandwagon like hospitals, hotels, public transport systems, retail chains, etc.
This could easily happen if driver's licensing and passports (the current methods of photo ID) start linking to this National ID. Which means if you have state or federally issued ID, then you by default end up being issued a 'National ID', or at best being required to have one in order to apply for other forms of ID.
By the time all the 'essential' private sector services start taking the easy road requiring this ID, then you're stuck with having one yourself or living like a hermit in a forest cabin and hunting for food.
And the federal government never needs to even legislate a single line to make it 'mandatory'.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 22 2019, @06:07AM (1 child)
Technically not even the Social Security Number is required. You don't have to sign up your kids for it. I remember hearing a RadioLab podcast about a girl whose parents never signed her up for one, and all the problems she had as an adult.
Heck, the Social Security Administration specifically doesn't guarantee that a person's SSN is unique. Sometimes the SSA erroneously assigns the same number to different people. I used to design databases, and had to explain this to people over and over again as to why you never make SSN a unique key. Yes, we (state government agency) caught multiple SSN usage; usually it was a typo, but legally all we could do is report the "problem" to the reporting parties. I always wondered how many people found out that way that someone else had stolen their identities.
(Score: 2) by RandomFactor on Sunday February 10 2019, @07:00PM
My original social security card had "Not to be used for identification" on the back. That worked out well.
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