Thirty people were killed in 17 crashes in 2025 involving what the left's dictionary calls "non-domiciled commercial drivers" who, under the Trump administration's current rule, would no longer qualify for those licenses.
The issue isn't foreign CDL drivers; plenty of lawful immigrants and foreign-born drivers safely operate commercial trucks daily. The issue is whether somebody who can't adequately read road signs, understand warnings, communicate with police, or follow instructions in English should be behind the wheel of an 80,000-pound commercial vehicle on an American highway.
That's a safety standard, not a nationality test.
When crashes expose drivers who apparently couldn't meet that basic standard, the question becomes unavoidable: Who licensed them, who failed to catch it, and why were they still on the road?
Senior U.S. District Judge Anthony Trenga put DHS's access to roughly 17 million commercial driver records on hold Friday. His administrative stay is temporary, and he hasn't ruled the subpoena unlawful.
DHS must file its opposition Monday, the states reply Wednesday, and Trenga has scheduled a hearing for Thursday.
DHS wants five years of records from the Commercial Driver's License Information System, including names, birth dates, license numbers, states of record, and Social Security numbers. The subpoena says the information would be used to investigate illegal practices at CDL schools, criminal fraud involving CDLs issued to illegal aliens, and civil immigration enforcement.
From the New York State Attorney General's press release:
New York Attorney General Letitia James today joined a multistate coalition of 21 other attorneys general and the state of Pennsylvania in suing to stop the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) from seizing the names, dates of birth, and Social Security numbers of 17 million commercial drivers nationwide, including nearly 500,000 New Yorkers. The administration is demanding access to a nationwide database containing the sensitive personal information of commercial driver's license (CDL) holders and has threatened to eliminate all federal funding for the system unless the records are turned over by August 17. Attorney General James and the coalition argue that the federal government has no legal authority to seize states' confidential driver records and is forcing states to choose between protecting drivers' privacy and preserving the system they rely on to issue CDLs. The coalition is asking the court to immediately block the administration's unlawful data demands and preserve the funding needed to keep the system operating.
"The Trump administration is attempting to seize confidential state records without any lawful justification," said Attorney General James. "New Yorkers provide their personal information to the state with the expectation that it will be protected, not handed over to anyone who demands it."
For nearly 40 years, states have relied on the Commercial Driver's License Information System (CDLIS) to ensure commercial drivers are properly licensed and qualified to operate commercial vehicles. States use CDLIS to determine whether applicants already hold a CDL in another state or have been disqualified for unsafe driving, helping keep dangerous drivers off the road. The database is owned by the states and operated by the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators (AAMVA).
The states have a legitimate privacy concern. Seventeen million Social Security numbers amount to an enormous transfer of sensitive information, and the federal government should explain why it needs the complete dataset and how it will protect it.
The court should demand those answers.
The safety record gives DHS an equally legitimate reason to investigate. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy's department says a nationwide audit identified more than 30 states issuing noncompliant CDLs, while more than 28,000 illegally issued licenses have already been revoked.
From the FMCSA's site:
U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean P. Duffy today announced that the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) is moving to codify guidelines that enforce English Language Proficiency (ELP) requirements for commercial motor vehicle (CMV) drivers into a new rule. By turning this guideline into a codified rule, future administrations will not be able to weaken ELP requirements like the Obama administration did allowing unqualified drivers to remain on U.S. roads.
Under the new standard, CMV drivers unable to sufficiently read or speak English or understand highway traffic signs and signals will be placed out-of-service. Secretary Duffy’s crackdown on dangerous drivers has already knocked more than 26,000 drivers off American roads for failing ELP tests.
“Federal law is clear, drivers who can’t read or speak English—our national language—or understand road signs are unqualified to operate 80,000-pound big rigs on America’s highways. By making these commonsense English proficiency standards permanent, we are closing a dangerous loophole that has cost Americans their lives. The Trump Administration is committed to putting American families first and ensuring the safety of our roads,” said U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean P. Duffy.
“When a driver can't read a 'Steep Grade,' 'Runaway Truck Ramp,' or 'Do Not Enter' sign, people die. This rulemaking codifies commonsense safety into law. Since reinvigorating strict ELP checks, we have already pulled over 26,000 unqualified drivers off the road. This rule ensures that roadside inspectors will always have the full force of federal regulation behind them to issue immediate out-of-service orders whenever an unqualified driver is detected,” said FMCSA Administrator Derek D. Barrs.
The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration said this month that over 26,000 commercial drivers have also been removed from service for failing English-language proficiency tests.
Those groups may overlap, and neither number proves 26,000 or 28,000 illegal immigrants were driving trucks. They do prove large weaknesses existed in licensing and enforcement. A driver controlling a commercial vehicle weighing as much as 80,000 pounds needs to understand signs, communicate with police, and meet every legal qualification before entering the highway.
The DUI comparison puts some scale on the numbers. NHTSA recorded 11,904 drunk-driving deaths in 2024, a rough mathematical average of 238 deaths per state.
From the NHTSA's website:
Every day, about 32 people in the United States die in drunk-driving crashes — that's one person every 44 minutes. In 2024, 11,904 people died in alcohol-impaired driving traffic deaths. These deaths were all preventable.
As alcohol levels rise in a person’s system, the negative effects on the central nervous system increase. Alcohol is absorbed directly through the walls of the stomach and small intestine. Then it passes into the bloodstream where it accumulates until it is metabolized by the liver. A person's alcohol level is measured by the weight of the alcohol in a certain volume of blood. This is called Blood Alcohol Concentration, or BAC. At a BAC of .08 grams of alcohol per deciliter (g/dL) of blood, crash risk increases exponentially. Because of this risk, it’s illegal in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico to drive with a BAC of .08 or higher, except in Utah where the BAC limit is .05.
However, even a small amount of alcohol can affect driving ability. In 2024, there were 2,028 people killed in alcohol-related crashes where a driver had a BAC of .01 to .07 g/dL.
BAC is measured with a breathalyzer, a device that measures the amount of alcohol in a driver’s breath, or by a blood test.
Alcohol-involved crashes also cost the country an estimated $68.9 billion annually based on 2019 figures, or about $1.38 billion per state if evenly divided.
A clean federal comparison for deaths, crashes, or economic damage caused specifically by illegal immigrants holding unlawfully issued CDLs isn't available. Federal statistics don't track the category in a way that supports such a circulation. Pretending otherwise would replace evidence with somebody's guess.
Thirty deaths in one federally identified subset still warrant attention. So do 28,000 revoked licenses and 26,000 English-proficiency failures. If fraud helped put unqualified people behind the wheel, investigators need a lawful way to find it.
Judge Trenga may decide DHS asked for too much information. DHS may have to narrow or better justify its request. But states shouldn't be allowed to turn a legitimate privacy concern into protection for unlawful licensing practices.
A family sharing the highway with a tractor-trailer doesn't care which agency owns the database. It cares whether the person in the cab earned the license, can read the signs, and knows the rules.
And before all those tests were given, the person was legally qualified to be there.
Washington fights over databases, jurisdiction, and privacy rules. We keep asking politicians would rather avoid: who pays when government gets it wrong? PJ Media VIP keeps that scrutiny alive without sanding off the edges. Join today and save 60% with promo code FIGHT.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member