WASHINGTON - Concerns about national security trump worries about privacy and the cost of a law calling for standardized driver's licenses among states, says U.S. Rep. Barbara Cubin, R-Wyo.

Cubin last week made the case for the Real ID Act to Wyoming lawmakers, likely helping quell an uprising against the law in her home state.

The Real ID Act, which Cubin co-sponsored, prohibits federal agencies - from airport screeners to post offices - from recognizing a state-issued driver's license unless the state standardized it to include required information that could be read by machine. It requires states that participate to share driver's license data with other states.

Privacy advocates say the effort could create a de facto national ID card. Meanwhile, state officials charge that complying with federal requirements will cost $11 billion and potentially double fees and waiting times for 245 million Americans whose licenses will have to be reissued starting next year.

The Sept. 11 commission recommended a program like Real ID. But given objections by Wyoming and numerous other states, congressional critics are trying to delay its implementation.

The Wyoming House during the current session overwhelmingly passed a joint resolution calling for the repeal of the Real ID Act, but a state Senate committee killed the measure after Cubin sent a letter in support of the federal law. The resolution called for Congress to repeal the act altogether, citing civil liberty and privacy concerns as well as the cost and burdens of the legislation.

The resolution, sponsored by Rep. Floyd Esquibel, D-Cheyenne, passed the state House 49-11, but died in the state Senate Mineral, Business and Economic Development Committee.

Committee Chairman Grant Larson, R-Jackson, said it was his decision, in consultation with committee members, to keep the resolution in committee.

"It was a piece of legislation that would have absolutely zero effect," Larson said Monday. "Congress isn't waiting for us to send a joint resolution."

Reporting the resolution to the floor of the Senate for debate would have had the potential of killing four or five other House bills because of the time consumed discussing the resolution, he added.

The resolution said the Real ID Act would create a "national identification card" by mandating federal standards for state driver's licenses and requiring states to share their motor vehicle databases.

It also said the act "requires the creation of a massive public sector database containing information on every American that is accessible to motor vehicle employees and law enforcement officers nationwide and that can be used to gather and manage information on citizens."

The act would "enable the crime of identity theft by making the personal information of all Americans, including date of birth and signature, accessible from tens of thousands of locations," the resolution stated.

Cubin rebutted some of the claims in her letter to state legislators. She wrote that she doesn't make a practice of weighing in on issues before the state Legislature but that "in this case … I felt it my duty to counteract misinformation surrounding Real ID."

She blamed most of the "false claims" on the American Civil Liberties Union, which opposes the federal law.

Cubin wrote that the law would not create a national ID or a national database of private information. "The federal Real ID program merely established a minimum national standard for physical and identity security that states may or may not elect to accept," she wrote.

"The new driver's licenses will allow state and federal law enforcement to check the authenticity of a license, but will not grant access to state databases of private information," she added.

Cubin noted that all the Sept. 11 terrorists held driver's licenses. "The Real ID program strikes the right balance between strengthening our homeland security and safeguarding our citizens' rights and privacy," she wrote.

She noted that both Wyoming senators voted for the plan. She also said Wyoming could receive federal grant money to offset the estimated $5 million cost to the state.

The National Governors Association estimated the national five-year cost at $11 billion. The group wants the federal government to provide funds and the electronic verification system needed to make the system work and allow states 10 years to implement it.

The issue threatens to turn into a partisan fight. The White House expects to release its driver's license plan this week and has warned congressional critics not to thwart or further delay a program that was recommended by the Sept. 11 commission.

"If we don't get it done now, someone's going to be sitting around in three or four years explaining to the next 9/11 commission why we didn't do it," Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff told the Senate's Homeland Security Committee on Feb. 13.

Critics in both parties will try to delay the launch of the program by offering an amendment to legislation that Senate Democrats are pushing to implement remaining changes suggested by the Sept. 11 commission.

The White House plan, which has been in the works for two years and will take effect in May 2008, standardizes information that must be included on licenses, including a digital photograph, a signature and machine-readable features such as a bar code.

The new rules also will spell out how states must verify applicants' citizenship status, check identity documents such as birth certificates and cross-check information with other states and with Social Security, immigration and State Department databases. Only complying IDs can be used for federal purposes such as boarding airplanes or entering government buildings.