ORLANDO, Fla. — The Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles announced last week that driver’s license exams will only be offered in English, ending tests in Spanish, Creole and other languages.

The change took effect Friday and has sparked mixed reactions in Central Florida. Some driving instructors said it could improve safety and standardize testing, but immigrant advocates believe it creates additional barriers and could affect the economy.

What You Need To Know

The Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles (FLHSMV) announced that, beginning Friday, all driver’s license knowledge and skills examinations will be administered only in English.

This change applies to all driver license classifications, including exams administered orally.

Previously, knowledge exams for most non-commercial driver license classifications were offered in multiple languages, while Commercial Learner’s Permit (CLP) and Commercial Driver License (CDL) knowledge exams were only available in English and Spanish.

Bonnie Frank is a quality assurance specialist with the Florida Safety Council and says the change to a single-language test will help keep roads safer.

“It’s a safety issue. When you’re out there on the roadway, everybody knows you have a lot of traffic, you have a lot of people that aren’t paying attention,” she said. “You have to be able to read those signs. You have to see the dangers ahead.”

Previously, knowledge exams for most non-commercial driver license classifications were offered in multiple languages, such as Spanish, Creole, and Portuguese. Under the updated policy, all driver’s license knowledge and skills testing will be conducted in English and without an interpreter.

“There are a lot of signs you can recognize by color, you can recognize by shape, and you can recognize by that it might have a picture on it, but not all signs have pictures on them,” Frank said.

Immigrant rights advocate Samuel Vilchez Santiago said the policy will hurt communities.

“This rule is absolutely discriminatory against the Hispanic community, against other immigrants who have come to Florida to contribute to our economy and to our society,” Vilchez Santiago said.

He said he was worried about the negative economic effects. According to 2024 U.S. Census data, about 28.7% of the state’s population is Hispanic or Latino.

“As you know, a lot of the workers who are driving every day to make sure that our state and our economy continue to move are people whose main language is not English,” Vilchez Santiago said.

At the Truck Driver Institute in Sanford, office manager Belinda DeJesus said they have long required English proficiency.

“We did get an influx of people that had very limited English, almost no English,” she said. “And, you know, we try to counsel them, take some English classes, become proficient in English. Some of them have beginner English. They just need to be a little more versed in the language.”

Now, when taking commercial learner’s permit and commercial driver’s license knowledge exams, the Spanish option will also be eliminated.

“I think it’s going to be a good thing,” DeJesus said. “I think there were already laws in place and regulations in place to have the English proficiency read, write, speak the English language, to be able to communicate with customers, to be able to communicate with other drivers.”

She said that for driving trucks, it’s crucial that drivers can understand all the rules of the road to ensure safety.

“We do real live training. They’re out in the trucks driving on the road. So, if they cannot understand an instruction that an instructor is giving them, then we have a major safety problem,” she said.

According to the notice from the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles, its testing system has been updated statewide to implement the change.

According to the American Trucking Associations, about 23% of truck drivers in the U.S. are Hispanic or Latino. The group says freight volumes are expected to grow through 2035, as an aging workforce retires, meaning demand for qualified drivers will remain strong.