{"id":52987,"date":"2025-11-14T13:44:10","date_gmt":"2025-11-14T13:44:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/52987\/"},"modified":"2025-11-14T13:44:10","modified_gmt":"2025-11-14T13:44:10","slug":"california-to-revoke-thousands-of-drivers-licenses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/52987\/","title":{"rendered":"California To Revoke Thousands of Driver\u2019s Licenses"},"content":{"rendered":"

California<\/a> is set to cancel the commercial driver\u2019s licenses of 17,000 immigrants whose immigration status<\/a>\u00a0has expired or will expire, officials said Wednesday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Newsweek\u00a0contacted the U.S. Department of Transportation\u00a0via email\u00a0and the Governor of California\u2019s office\u00a0via phone\u00a0outside usual working\u00a0hours for\u00a0comment.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Why It Matters\u00a0<\/p>\n

California\u2019s plan to revoke\u00a0thousands of\u00a0commercial driver\u2019s licenses issued to immigrants follows heightened criticism from President Donald Trump<\/a>‘s administration\u00a0regarding\u00a0California and other states for issuing commercial licenses to individuals in the country illegally or whose immigration<\/a> status had lapsed.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The issue drew public scrutiny in August after a crash involving a truck driver without legal U.S. status<\/a> killed three people in Florida.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It is set to cause\u00a0ripple effects on businesses and communities that depend on commercial drivers.\u00a0The owner of one\u00a0major trucking firm, FBT\u00a0Incorporated, told\u00a0KGET.com he was\u00a0set to lose 50 drivers because of the measures.\u00a0<\/p>\n

What To Know\u00a0<\/p>\n

California announced\u00a0the plans\u00a0after discovering that the licenses had\u00a0expiration\u00a0dates extending beyond the period of authorized U.S. residency for the holders.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

State law requires such licenses to expire no later than the end of the person\u2019s lawful U.S. status, according to statements from Governor Gavin Newsom<\/a>\u2019s office and the California Department of Motor Vehicles.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Following an audit spearheaded by U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, California\u2019s DMV reviewed its licensing program and\u00a0identified\u00a0widespread discrepancies involving the alignment of license\u00a0expiration\u00a0dates and immigration authorization periods.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

New federal requirements introduced in September now restrict commercial driver\u2019s license eligibility to three visa categories: H-2A, H-2B, and E-2.\u00a0\u00a0H-2a concerns temporary agricultural workers; H-2b, temporary nonagricultural workers; and E-2 pertains to those who make substantial investments in a U.S. business.<\/p>\n

According to The Associated Press, these rules are expected to reduce the number of eligible noncitizen drivers in California from\u00a0approximately 200,000\u00a0to 10,000, though the new criteria are not retroactive and will\u00a0only\u00a0apply to future applicants.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Munmeeth\u00a0Kaur, legal director of the Sikh Coalition,\u00a0said\u00a0that her organization has filed suit in Washington, D.C., temporarily blocking the order from the Department of Transportation<\/p>\n

What People Are Saying\u00a0<\/p>\n

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy\u00a0said, according to AP: \u201cAfter weeks of claiming they did nothing wrong, Gavin Newsom and California have been caught red-handed. Now that\u00a0we\u2019ve\u00a0exposed their lies, 17,000 illegally issued trucking licenses are being revoked.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Gavin Newsom\u2019s office said that all affected drivers previously had valid federal work authorizations and that the revocation is in response to state law requirements for\u00a0expiration\u00a0alignment.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Newsom spokesperson\u00a0Brandon Richards\u00a0accused Duffy of “spreading falsehoods”\u00a0regarding\u00a0California\u2019s compliance standards,\u00a0per\u00a0AP.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Dave Laut, owner of FBT Incorporated in Bakersfield, told KGET.com:\u00a0\u201cI\u00a0don\u2019t\u00a0know what the plan is. We are shocked because we just got sudden calls and letters from many drivers saying, ‘Oh, we only have 60 days left.’ … One driver has been on the road for 15 years, driving<\/a> safely with a good record, and how can we say this driver is no good,\u00a0it\u2019s\u00a0unsafe.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Bakersfield City Councilmember\u00a0Manpreet Kaur\u00a0said, per\u00a0KGET.com:\u00a0\u201cIn a time when we are struggling to have and keep jobs in our region, in Kern County and Bakersfield, a lot of these federal policies and forms of discrimination that are coming down are doing the exact opposite of what our region needs.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Munmeeth\u00a0Kaur said, per KGET.com: “We\u2019re hoping that the California government will clarify and rescind revoking the licenses.” <\/p>\n

What Happens Next\u00a0<\/p>\n

The state has provided affected drivers with a 60-day window to adjust their legal status or face license loss.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Legal pushback has temporarily blocked immediate revocation, as courts consider the challenge brought by the Sikh Coalition and other advocates.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

If California does not\u00a0comply with\u00a0federal requirements, the U.S. Department of Transportation has threatened to withhold up to $160 million in federal funding, with a prior $40 million already at risk over English language enforcement for drivers.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"California is set to cancel the commercial driver\u2019s licenses of 17,000 immigrants whose immigration status\u00a0has expired or will…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":52988,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,9,8,3159,457,14,7199,1519],"class_list":{"0":"post-52987","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-california","8":"tag-california","9":"tag-california-headlines","10":"tag-california-news","11":"tag-driving","12":"tag-gavin-newsom","13":"tag-immigration","14":"tag-truck-driver","15":"tag-trump"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52987","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52987"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52987\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/52988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}