Tagged: Immigration

The North Carolina Department of Transportation has made an about face and is abandoning its controversial decision to add a bold pink stripe across the top of new driver licenses for young immigrants.  A news release issued Thursday afternoon by the state DOT confirms that the Division of Motor Vehicles will begin issuing driver licenses on Monday, March 25, 2013 for immigrants qualifying under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.  But the attached ‘final’ image of the driver license no longer has the pink stripe or the words ‘No Lawful Status’ printed in large type.

Educators don’t often get a chance to celebrate publicly, so it was understandable when State Superintendent June Atkinson stood up at a news conference last fall and bragged a little about North Carolina’s 80 percent high school graduation rate.

“This is excellent news for our state and one more step toward ensuring that all of our students graduate from high school career, college, and citizenship ready,” said Atkinson.

A new survey shows farmers across North Carolina are worried about the agricultural workforce shortage.  And they want Immigration Reform to help fix it.  More than 600 farmers filled out the Agricultural Workforce survey spear-headed by the North Carolina Farm Bureau.  Faylene Whitaker of Whitaker Farms in Climax, NC, filled one out.

State DOT officials will issue redesigned driver's licenses later this year that will visually distinguish citizens from non-citizens.   Immigrants here under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program will notice their licenses will have the words "No Lawful Status" printed on them.  State DOT spokeswoman Greer Beaty says those words will be in a bar across the top that will differ from the blue on a normal license.