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9/11 Group: Maine Legislature Clueless on Proven Terrorist Threat from Driver's Licenses

If Maine ops out of the program, it could put the entire nation at risk, Coalition asserts.

Members of the Maine Legislature who supported a resolution yesterday calling for repeal of the federal Real ID Act -- a key anti-terrorist measure urgently recommended by the 9/11 Commission -- are "clueless about the real and critical terrorist threat that state-issued driver's licenses in the wrong hands pose to all Americans," the Coalition for a Secure Driver's License, an organization dedicated to preventing terrorists from getting and using licenses again to kill American citizens, said today. The group includes family members of those killed in the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

The 9/11 terrorists infamously used state-issued driver's licenses to plan and execute their attacks. They received dozens of them from states with weak licensing laws and used them to attend flight schools, rent cars and safe houses, receive money wire transfers from operational contacts overseas ($100,000) and, ultimately, to board the airplanes that day -- some in Portland, Maine. In addition, driver's licenses, America's de facto identity card, can be used to buy guns and ammunition, enter sensitive government and commercial facilities, and to appear as legitimate citizen's at security checkpoints around the nation.

"Driver's licenses are a key terrorist tool that open doors to places we cannot allow terrorists to enter again," said Peter Gadiel, a Coalition Board Member and President of 9/11 Families for a Secure America. "A Maine license in the hands of a terrorist can do as much damage in New York or Washington, D.C. as in Portland or Augusta. The al Qaeda cell that killed my son in the World Trade Center got its licenses from Florida, Maryland, California and Virginia."

Real ID was passed by Congress and signed into law by President Bush in March 2005. It was a key 9/11 Commission recommendation that calls for uniform standards for state-issued driver's licenses. Those standards have not yet been issued by the Department of Homeland Security. If Maine ops out of the program, it could put the entire nation at risk, the Coalition asserted.