Kaye Beach
Feb 16, 2011
Our privacy will once again lose to these shenanigans.
HB1399 by Rep Wesselhoft would simply prohibit the use of RFID tracking devices in our state driver’s licenses and ID cards.
This is the third time that this very simple and very popular bill has been run in the Oklahoma state legislature. The first time it passed overwhelmingly in the House and Senate only to be killed by Governor Brad Henry after a love letter from a powerful industry lobbyist. (See Meet the Chippers 2010 )People in Oklahoma from the Right to the Left supported this bill, our legislators supported this bill but the industry lobbyists had the final say.
Last session the heads of the Public Safety Committee just outright killed the bill and this session it appears that Rep. Steve “Robo Cop” Martin is using the same old dirty lobbyists tricks to destroy the anti-RFID bill that we saw attempted in the first session the bill was run. Rep. Sue “Big Momma Gov. Tibbs promises to kill the bill if the committee substitute that Rep. Martin has offered isn’t accepted. (the amendment actually reverses the intent of HB1399)
From OK-SAFE posted Feb 16, 2012;
OK-SAFE Inc. – Evidence of the powerful RFID lobby in the Oklahoma Legislature, the bill prohibiting RFID tags in the OK drivers license will only be heard in committee if the author of the bill agrees to new language allowing RFID tags in the Oklahoma drivers license.
Rep. Steve Martin, vice-chair of the House Public Safety committee, has offered a proposed committee substitute for HB 1399, by Rep. Paul Wesselhoft. Martin’s proposed language is a backdoor attempt to allow the state to imbed RFID tags in drivers licenses and state issued-identification cards, while limiting their use.
Currently, the state of Oklahoma does not allow RFID tags in their drivers licenses, despite the federal push to add them. (See prior post on this bill here and information on the REAL ID debacle here.)
If Wesselhoft refuses Martin’s new language, committee Chairman Rep. Sue Tibbs will not allow the bill a hearing.
Those two commies keep rearing their ugly heads…
Sounds like an issue Oklahomans would easily pass in an initiative petition.