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Tags: New York | NYC ID card | immigration | Rudy Giuliani | Bill de Blasio

Giuliani: What's the Purpose of NYC ID Card?

By    |   Wednesday, 12 February 2014 12:12 PM EST

Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani questioned Democratic Mayor Bill de Blasio's new policy to issue municipal ID cards to residents, asking what purpose it served when they were issued by a city.

"The card for immigrants, I don't understand how a city alone can give a card to someone. What good is it going to do?" Giuliani, a Republican, told "Fox & Friends" Wednesday.

De Blasio kicked off his first term as New York's mayor with a pledge to issue municipal ID cards to the city's residents. They would allow people to open bank accounts, cash checks, sign apartment leases, and see doctors in hospitals.

Story continues after the video


Giuliani said the result would be to point out a person's illegal immigration status, and predicted the move would hurt immigrants.

"All this will do is actually going to hurt illegal immigrants," the former mayor said. "He's going to point them out as exceptions."

"'There is the illegal immigrant. He's got the card.' You and I will have driver's licenses. They'll have, 'I'm an illegal immigrant,'" he said.

Raising the minimum wage, as de Blasio has also pledged to do, would drive businesses out of the city, Giuliani predicted. He said that effort would have to be implemented statewide, and had doubts the New York legislature would approve it.

"To raise the minimum wage just in New York City, not the rest of the state, will drive businesses out of New York City, into New Jersey, into Nassau County, into Westchester County," he said.

The progressive ideas fueling many of the changes in de Blasio's administration "have been tried in New York City before, all these liberal ideas, and the economy in the city was a disaster," Giuliani said. "Does anybody think out these things, or they just say them?"

Giuliani said he, like other mayors, took the helm in New York at a period when the city was a "disaster," with high deficits and unemployment.

By contrast, Giuliani said de Blasio was taking over a city from former Mayor Michael Bloomberg "that's really well run." He said the effects of de Blasio's new policies wouldn't be seen right away.

"Mayor Bloomberg left him with an exceptionally well run, very good functioning city. And, it's going to take a while for that to deteriorate," he said.

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Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani questioned Democratic Mayor Bill de Blasio's new policy to issue municipal ID cards to residents, asking what purpose it served when they were issued by a city.
New York,NYC ID card,immigration,Rudy Giuliani,Bill de Blasio
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2014-12-12
Wednesday, 12 February 2014 12:12 PM
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