By Dan Frosch | The New York Times
In one of their final acts before wrapping up the Colorado legislative session on Wednesday, lawmakers approved a bill allowing immigrants who are in the country illegally to obtain driver’s licenses, making the state one of only a handful to have passed such a measure.
The legislation, which received final approval on Tuesday, allows immigrants to get special licenses if they can prove they pay taxes and meet several other requirements.
For immigrant-rights advocates and their Democratic allies in the Statehouse here, the bill’s passage was the latest in a string of hard-won victories involving proposals that once seemed more symbolic than practical.
Emboldened this year by a majority in both legislative chambers, and buoyed by an influx of young Latino lawmakers, Democrats pushed legislation granting in-state tuition rates to students who are in the country illegally. And they overturned a 2006 law requiring the police to notify federal authorities of people suspected of being in the United States illegally.
