Tag Archives: commercial truck driving license (CDL)

Protecting Americans On Our Highways

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On Wednesday, Just the News posted an article about the Wyoming Highway Patrol’s crackdown on Commercial Drivers License holders who are here illegally and don’t speak or understand English.

The article reports:

High-profile fatal accidents on America’s highways involving semi-truck drivers with limited proficiency in English have led to a nationwide effort to crack down on the issuing of commercial driver’s licenses (CDL) to such drivers. 

Statistics that the Wyoming Highway Patrol released last week show how widespread the problem is. Out of 16,676 inspections on commercial vehicles in 2025, 676 resulted in violations where drivers failed the interview because they weren’t proficient in the English language. 

This was the eighth most frequent violation Wyoming officials cited drivers for, and these are the numbers for just one state. Recently, the Laramie County Sheriff’s Office in southern Wyoming, Cowboy State Daily reported, had a three-day operation in which 82 commercial trucks were stopped, and 32 illegal immigrants were arrested. 

The article notes:

The U.S. Department of Transportation announced this week it had begun targeting “CDL mills.” More than 550 training schools for CDLs were closed following 1,400 sting operations by 300 investigations in all states, according to The Center Square. 

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration found that many of the shuttered schools had no qualified instructors, used fake addresses, and provided inadequate training for things like transporting hazardous materials. 

Last month, the USDOT announced that all commercial driver’s license tests will be administered in English. 

The article concludes:

One well-regarded CDL school explains the dangers of big rig crashes on the highway. At 50 mph, the energy is almost three times greater than at 30 mph, and at that speed, in collisions with cars, the smaller vehicle is often crushed or pushed aside violently, leaving little chance for its occupants’ safety. 

But at 70 mph, the forces are overwhelming. Fatalities become the expected outcome, not the exception. At this speed, a truck crash is often indistinguishable from a demolition event, with energy levels beyond what crumple zones or airbags can counteract.

An 80,000-pound truck cruising down the interstate at 80 miles per hour may not be carrying 200 passengers as would an aircraft. But it can do a lot of damage, and accidents — especially at higher speeds — are more often than not deadly. 

How many unemployed Americans are capable of getting a CDL license and driving a truck? It seems as if we could find some.

The Corruption Runs Deep And Is Not Localized

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On Saturday, Just the News posted an article about commercial drivers licenses (CDLs) issued in Illinois. I would like to note that Just the News is one of the few unbiased investigative news sources on the internet.

The article reports:

The Illinois official whose agency issued potentially thousands of illegal licenses to truckers, received more than $300,000 in donations from the trucking industry in recent years. The Illinois Secretary of State, Alexi Giannoulias, is in a standoff with the Trump Transportation Department over its review of the state’s commercial drivers licenses (CDLs) which found that 1-in-5 licenses issued by Giannoulias’ office were done so illegally. 

Giannoulias, a Democrat who is reportedly considering a run for Chicago mayor, is facing scrutiny over his office’s role in issuing those licenses from the Trump administration after a series of high profile big rig crashes across the country that exposed issues in how states issue non-domiciled CDLs to foreign citizens, or in some cases, to illegal immigrants. 

In Illinois, the U.S. Transportation Department found the Secretary of State’s Office, through the Director of Driver Services, issued illegal CDLs, in some cases, to individuals who have failed to provide evidence of lawful presence, let alone proficiency in managing big rigs.

The article concludes:

In August, an illegal immigrant driver made an illegal u-turn on the Florida Turnpike in his 18-wheeler truck, causing a crash that left three dead, the Homeland Security Department said. The immigrant was identified as Harjinder Singh, an illegal alien from India.

Before the fatal crash in Florida, Singh reportedly failed his CDL driver’s test 10 times, before finally being granted a license in 2023 in Washington State, according to Fox News. Instructors also noted a lack of English proficiency, with video evidence showing Singh struggled to speak English with police in the wake of the crash. 

The Transportation Department’s audits in other states also uncovered what it says is “systemic non-compliance in issuing non-domiciled CDLs.” In California, the department’s audit found that “more than 25% of non-domiciled CDLs reviewed were improperly issued.” In New York State, it found that more than half of non-domiciled CDLs were issued in violation of federal law. In Colorado, the fraction was 22%. 

These findings led the administration to pull federal funding until the states remedy the license issuing process to prevent such failures. Secretary Duffy’s agency issued a final rule last week that would prevent foreign drivers from receiving a non-domicile CDL without undergoing a consular and interagency screening. 

Ending the fraud in CDL licensing will make the roads safer for everyone.

Following The Rules Saves Lives

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On Friday, Breitbart posted an article about the recent deadly crash allegedly caused by an illegal migrant truck driver from India.

The article reports:

Jashanpreet Singh, 21, was charged Thursday by the San Bernardino County District Attorney’s Office with three counts of vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence and one count of DUI causing injury in the eight-vehicle pileup, ABC7 reported.

A Los Angeles County high school basketball coach and his wife were killed, with Pomona High School identifying the victims as Clarence Nelson and his wife, Lisa. The third victim’s identity was not publicly released by Friday. 

The article includes a statement by Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy:

“My prayers are with the families of the victims of this tragedy. It would have never happened if Gavin Newsom had followed our new rules,” Duffy said in a statement obtained by Breitbart News. “California broke the law and now three people are dead and two are hospitalized. These people deserve justice. There will be consequences.”

A report from the Department of Transportation (DOT) shows every step where California let Singh obtain his CDL against the department’s policies put in place following the state’s “significant compliance failures” revealed by a recent audit that found that 25 percent of non-domiciled CDLs sampled were issued improperly. 

The article notes:

On June 27, then 20-year-old Singh, claiming to be an asylum seeker, was issued a restricted, non-domiciled CDL. The license included a “K restriction,” which limited him to in-state operation, DOT said.  

On September 26, Duffy formally notified California of its compliance failures after a department audit revealed the staggering amount of improperly-issued CDLs. To fix the issue, DOT required California to pause issuance of non-domiciled CDLs, identify all unexpired non-domiciled CDLs that fail to comply with Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) regulations, and to revoke and reissue all noncompliant non-domiciled CDLs if they comply with the new federal requirements.

Please follow the link to read the entire article. Governor Newsom is attempting to put the blame on the federal government, but I don’t think that really works. The bottom line is that we have a lot of people in the country illegally who don’t speak English and are driving large trucks. That is not a good thing.

In Case You Were Wondering…

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Recently, there was a fatal traffic accident in Florida caused by an illegal immigrant who could not read or speak English. Many of us wondered how he managed to get his commercial drivers license (I believe that the test for this license is only given in English and Spanish–he was from India).

The dotdriverfiles reports the following:

Starting June 25, 2025, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) will begin strictly enforcing English Language Proficiency (ELP) requirements for commercial drivers. While this regulation has existed for years under 49 CFR § 391.11(b)(2), the new enforcement approach means drivers who fail roadside language assessments will be immediately placed out-of-service (OOS).

On Friday, Breitbart reported:

Florida police have discovered how migrants who cannot speak English have been getting licenses to drive 18-wheelers on the nation’s highways.

With news breaking all across the country of major highway accidents that have killed Americans perpetrated by non-English speaking migrants behind the wheels of massive semi trucks, many have wondered how they could be getting their licenses. Investigators in Florida have discovered that one way is by using hidden cameras and ear pieces when they enter a drive’s license facility to take their commercial truck driving license (CDL) test, WTLV-TV reported.

Investigators from the Florida State Police have discovered that some foreign-born applicants are using a camera and an ear piece connected to someone outside the DMV facility who speaks their language to cheat on the tests. The applicant uses the camera to scan the test so his cohort can read the questions, then they tell the applicant how to answer the test questions over the ear piece. That way, the migrants can pass the test without having read a single question or understood any of the answers.

Recently, the State Police arrested and convicted several migrants who used this cheat to take CDL tests at a Jacksonville, Florida, DMV. One man arrested in April was sentenced to eight months in prison for the scheme to illegally obtain a Florida CDL, another was handed over to ICE for deportation, and three more satisfied court-ordered measures and their cases were dismissed.

This is a safety issue. Cheating puts all Americans at risk.

The article concludes:

The problem of non-English speaking drivers has skyrocketed since so many migrants took trucking industry jobs after entering the U.S. through President Joe Biden’s loose border policies, either at the southern border or at international airports.

With the spotlight on foreign CDL drivers after a horrendous and fatal accident in Florida this month, Florida officials announced that under a new immigration enforcement program, truck weigh stations in the state will be used as U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) checkpoints.

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier also announced that agricultural inspection stations will also serve as immigration checkpoints going forward.

Hopefully these actions will make our highways safer.