California Revokes 17,000 Trucking Licenses After Federal Crackdown on Immigrant Drivers
California officials are moving to revoke 17,000 commercial driver’s licenses issued to immigrants after a federal review raised alarms that some were granted to people no longer legally authorized to work in the United…
California officials are moving to revoke 17,000 commercial driver’s licenses issued to immigrants after a federal review raised alarms that some were granted to people no longer legally authorized to work in the United States.
According to The Associated Press, the state’s Department of Motor Vehicles said it discovered that the licenses had expiration dates extending beyond the drivers’ legal residency or work authorization — a violation of federal commercial licensing standards.
Governor Gavin Newsom’s office insists the decision was made for compliance reasons, not political ones. “These licenses were revoked because state officials discovered their expiration dates had passed when the drivers were legally allowed to be in the United States,” the California State Transportation Agency said in a statement.
The move follows intense scrutiny from Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, who launched a nationwide audit of commercial driver’s licenses after several deadly crashes involving illegal immigrant truck drivers — including a Florida collision that killed three people and a California wreck last month that left three more dead.
Duffy hailed California’s move as a vindication of his warnings. “After weeks of claiming they did nothing wrong,