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The state Republican Party today filed a lawsuit against the Taxation and Revenue Department over its request for the names of the 30,000 immigrants with New Mexico drivers licenses.

The party in July asked for a list of licenses that have been issued to people who are not citizens or legal residents of the United States.

In response, it got a largely blacked out stack of about 150 pages of documents.

"We're asking for the release of the withheld names," said Nina Martinez, the Republican Party secretary.

The party wants the list so it can compare it to a list of registered voters.

"We want to run them against voter registration rolls to make sure they aren't using their license to vote," she said.

David Harwell, a spokesman for the Taxation and Revenue Department, said this morning he hadn't seen the suit and couldn't comment.

The lawsuit was filed in state district court in Albuquerque.

After the party received the list in response to an Inspection of Public Records request, it on Sept. 20 appealed to the Taxation and Revenue Department, according to the lawsuit.

The department to date has not responded, the lawsuit alleges.

The Republicans object to the department's reasoning for blacking out the information. At the time, it claimed executive privilege protected the information it blacked out from being released to the public.

Open government advocates have said the list clearly is public information and should be released.

The party also alleges the department didn't respond in a timely manner under the state's Inspection of Public Records Act.

In addition to asking the court to order the state to produce the documents as soon as possible, the GOP wants the department to pay its legal fees for the lawsuit.

It also wants the state to adopt policies that would correct the procedures that resulted in what it says are the improper denials of public records in this case.

Gov. Bill Richardson in 2003 signed a law that allows immigrants to use a Mexican-government produced identification known as the matricula consular when they apply for a license. The law has been successful, according to supporters, who say it's helped drop the number of uninsured drivers.

Opponents say it could be used to vote fraudulently and have questioned the authenticity of the documents used to obtained the licenses.

The state is in the process of auditing all the documents used to issue those licenses. The audit is expected to be completed this fall.

The Republicans also have tangled with the Secretary of State's Office this year over a request for the names of 201,000 voters whose voter registration cards were returned to them.

The party has asked that those voters be asked to provide identification when they vote in the Nov. 7 election.