California will delay the revocation of 17,000 commercial driver’s licenses until March after migrant groups sued the state, an announcement it made Tuesday, according to the Associated Press.
The delay is intended to give the state more time to ensure that commercial truck and bus drivers who meet legal requirements can keep their permits, AP reported.
The move comes amid pressure from Washington. U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said California could lose $160 million if it does not meet a Jan. 5 deadline to revoke the licenses, AP reported. Duffy also said he had already withheld $40 million in federal funds, saying California was not enforcing requirements related to English competency for truck drivers.
Duffy previously urged the state to revoke licenses in a way that would prevent undocumented immigrants from receiving them. AP said the state’s decision followed an audit that identified licensing issues, including licenses that remained valid even after a person’s permission to be in the country had expired, as well as cases in which the state could not show it verified a driver’s immigration status.
In a post on X, Duffy wrote: “California NO tiene una ‘prórroga’ para seguir violando la ley y poniendo en riesgo a los estadounidenses en las carreteras.”
AP said the federal push has focused on traffic-safety concerns since an August crash in Florida involving a truck driver who did not have the relevant permits. AP reported that the driver made an illegal U-turn and caused an accident that left three people dead. The AP story also said the driver in the Florida crash and another fatal crash in California in October are Sikh.
California officials said they are working to ensure that the federal Transportation Department is satisfied with reforms the state has implemented. AP reported that California had planned to resume issuing commercial driver’s licenses in mid-December, but the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration prevented it.
DMV Director Steve Gordon said commercial drivers are critical to the economy and to community life, saying: “Los conductores comerciales son una parte importante de nuestra economía: nuestras cadenas de suministro no se mueven y nuestras comunidades no permanecen conectadas sin ellos.”
The delay followed a lawsuit. AP reported that the Sikh Coalition and the Asian Law Caucus, based in San Francisco, filed a class-action suit on behalf of California drivers, arguing that immigrant truckers were being treated unfairly. AP said Mumeeth Kaur, the Sikh Coalition’s legal director, called the delay “un paso importante hacia la mitigación de la amenaza inmediata que estos conductores enfrentan a sus vidas y medios de subsistencia.”
AP also said migrants account for about 20% of all truck drivers, while permits for nonresident immigrants account for about 5% of all commercial driver’s licenses—around 200,000 drivers. The story said the Transportation Department proposed new restrictions on which foreign nationals could obtain a license, but a court suspended those restrictions.
Duffy had earlier threatened to withhold millions of dollars from California, Pennsylvania and Minnesota after audits found significant problems with existing licensing rules, AP reported. AP said those problems included commercial licenses that stayed valid long after a foreign worker’s work permit expired. AP reported that Duffy withdrew the $160 million threat to California after the state said it would revoke permits, saying authorities were complying with the federal requirements.
Industry groups, according to AP, praised the plan to remove drivers they said are not qualified to be on the road and applauded the Transportation Department’s efforts to target questionable commercial driver’s license schools.