Governor Jay Nixon says his Department of Revenue is not feeding a database of personal information on Missourians who have applied for driver’s and non-driver’s licenses and concealed carry permits.
Governor Jay Nixon answers reporters’ questions after speaking to the House Republican Caucus.
Nixon has responded to the recent issues raised primarily by legislative Republicans over the Revenue Department scanning personal documents from those applicants.
“This Department of Revenue and this State of Missouri is not collecting a bunch of unuseful data to send to some sort of magical database someplace to mess with people. It’s not happening, OK? We’re at a time when in which a lot of people like to have a lot of discussions about that and play into folks’ concerns about this and that and then throw around names and all that sort of stuff, but they’re just not doin’ it. I mean, you know that and I know that.”
Asked directly whether the Department is enforcing the federal Real I.D. Act, Nixon says he thinks it is not.
“I’ve not gotten into the details on this other than to say that no, we’re not moving forward on trying to implement Real I.D. I signed a measure directly on that and we’re following the law that I signed.”
Asked about the Homeland Security website stating that Missouri has filed a compliance package on Real I.D., Nixon said only, “I spend a lot of time doing a lot of things. Reading what federales say about us on websites is certainly not one of ’em.”
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The Revenue Department has testified that copies made of driver’s license and concealed carry permit applicant information has been stored at the state data center. It says that same data is currently sent to a private company, MorphoTrust USA in Georgia, where licenses are printed. The company is then supposed to destroy the pertinent data.
Nixon says the issue did not come up when he spoke to the House Republican Caucus today about Medicaid expansion and reform, the issues he says lawmakers should be focused on.
