Republican-ruled Georgia is issuing drivers licenses to illegal aliens – and it looks like the AJC wants to keep it that way.

In the current 40 session-day 2015 Georgia General Assembly, Republican state Senator Josh McKoon has sponsored SB 6, legislation that would end the practice of rewarding illegal aliens who benefit from Obama’s executive DACA amnesty and the soon-to-come DAPA amnesty with a Georgia driver’s license and official state ID cards.

The well-written legislation would keep DLs and state ID cards from all illegal aliens.

According to DHS, the Peach State has more illegal aliens than Arizona, ranks number seven in the nation in its population of illegals and (when he would mention the crisis) Republican Governor Nathan Deal has cited “$2.4 billion” as an annual cost of the crime of illegal immigration to Georgia taxpayers.

The Georgia legislature is huge majority Republican. In fact, the Senate has a GOP super-majority. They can literally pass anything they can agree on – including a resolution to allow a popular vote on amending the state constitution to make English the constitutional official language of state government. A resolution doing exactly that was allowed to die in committee last year. The Atlanta-Area Chamber of Commerce and the Georgia Chamber of Commerce proudly and very proudly and publicly claimed responsibility for the “let the people vote” resolution’s demise along with a bill similar to this year’s SB 6. Too “anti-business.”

It is somewhat amusing and very instructive to watch most of the Georgia Senate dodge the issue of Obama’s amnesty while the state itself is a plantiff in the 26-state lawsuit challenging the Emperor’s amnesty proclamation. Ah…politics and the power of the Chamber of Commerce.

A successful attorney from Columbus, the young, up-and-coming and unabashedly pro-enforcement McKoon is also Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

There are 38 Republican Georgia state Senators. They all ran as “conservatives.” To date, only 11 have publicly picked a side on driver’s licenses to illegal aliens and shown their support for McKoon’s bill by co-sponsoring it. The chances of any of them being elected or re-elected three months ago by proclaiming their support for DLs to illegals are…zero to zero.

A few more alarming facts: Many state legislators are clueless that driver’s licenses are going to DACA victims of borders. Many more have no idea that Obama’s Emperor-like decree of deferred action on deportation does not change the fact that the illegal aliens who receive that deferred action does not grant legal status – they are still illegal aliens. For the “that can’t be true, if it was I would have read it in the newspaper” set: we give you the USCIS website – “Deferred action does not provide lawful status.”

Having quite incorrectly told its readers that legislation passed in 2013 stopped DACA illegals from getting driver’s licenses, the AJC is apparently operating on the correct assumption that too much information distributed to the voting public would result in an outraged ground swell of pressure from irate conservative voters and swift approval of SB 6 in the Senate. While other issues repetitivly hit the AJC pages like daily raindrops, as far as I can see they have run one report on the bill – in November, when McKoon pre-filed his bill. There has been nothing on the OP-ED pages about this oh-so inconvenient measure.

Transportation taxes, selling beer onsite at breweries and religious freedom legislation get most of the AJC coverage.

McKoon has also written a very educational OP-ED that he was told would be welcomed for consideration on the AJC opinion page. Having sent the commentary in, McKoon’s last report to me was that he has not heard back from the “credible, compelling, complete” beacon of enlightenment in Georgia. His piece aimed at educating the public – and his fellow legislators on the fact that GOP-Georgia is giving illegal aliens drivers licenses – has run in several other, more open-minded Georgia newspapers, Georgia political websites and on Townhall.com .

It may help readers to get the picture here by understanding hat the AJC’s senior managing editor – Bert Roughton Jr. – is also senior editorial director. Handy, isn’t it?

A long time AJC staffer, Roughton has referred to his job as “newspapering.” As a long time AJC reader, I agree, but not in a good way.

It may also help to “tell the story” from Atlanta to know newspapering-Roughton’s wife, Melinda Ennis Roughton is a mover/shaker in the Georgia business and advertising community and seems to be quite outspoken in partisan politics. You can decide for your self what side she is on by reading her 2009 piece “10 reasons Southerners should vote Democratic” and her profile.

More on Roughton and his activist (not that there is anything wrong with that) wife from an industrious local blogger HERE

Anyway the AJC dumped the concept of “public editor” years ago when new management was brought in to save the paper. Apparently, readers are urged to contact any managment staffer to ask questions or lodge complaints.

Regarding the 2013 news report from the AJC’s “justice in journalism” and New York Times – trained immigration reporter, Jeremy Redmon, I have contacted a senior editor asking if there was any correction to the false story from 2013, and if they are considering offering a complete and compelling education educating on the details of McKoon’s legislation.

After a week, I still have no response from the AJC. The 2013 report from Redmon is posted in part below:

Atlanta Journal Constitution

Thursday, April 25, 2013

By Jeremy Redmon

Law bars illegal immigrants from Ga. driver’s license

Gov. Nathan Deal has quietly signed into law a measure that will expand Georgia’s crackdown on illegal immigration as Congress debates overhauling the nation’s immigration system.
Senate Bill 160 is aimed at blocking illegal immigrants from obtaining state driver’s licenses, grants, public housing and retirement benefits. The law, to take effect July 1, will also prevent people from using foreign passports to get public benefits in Georgia, unless those passports include paperwork indicating they are in the country legally.

Deal signed the measure Wednesday without public comment. The legislation expands on House Bill 87, a comprehensive immigration measure he signed into law in 2011.

The Republican governor’s decision to sign the new legislation comes as national GOP leaders are recalibrating their positions on immigration after President Barack Obama’s re-election win last year with about 70 percent of the Hispanic vote.

Congress is now considering a bipartisan bill that would provide a pathway to citizenship for the estimated 11 million immigrants living illegally in the U.S. The federal Homeland Security Department estimated there were 440,000 immigrants living illegally in Georgia in 2011.

About 1,500 people marched through downtown Atlanta on April 10 in support of Congress overhauling the immigration system. Among other things, the demonstrators called on Deal to veto SB 160.

SB 160 is also intended to clean up several unintended problems created by the state’s 2011 immigration law.

For example, the bill is aimed at preventing massive backlogs for professional license renewals. Those backlogs were created by a provision in the 2011 law that requires applicants to show certain forms of “secure and verifiable” identification every time they renew their licenses.

“This legislation fixes some of the unintended consequences of the 2011 immigration legislation,” said Brian Robinson, a spokesman for the governor. “This will restore efficiency to government services, such as receiving a professional license, while still safeguarding taxpayers against the costs of illegal immigration.”

Secretary of State Brian Kemp, whose office handles professional license applications, praised the legislation.

“SB 160 will help hardworking Georgians get in the workforce faster,” he said in a prepared statement…

The report was behind a paywall HERE.

If it still is and if you are not an AJC subscriber (there is a lot of that going around), you can read the entire report for $.99 if I understand the process correctly.