Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy’s surprise appearance at the Mid-America Trucking Show drew big crowds and plenty of applause, but after giving a brief speech, he was confronted by a non-domiciled CDL driver set to lose his license to the Trump administration’s crackdown.
The brief confrontation highlights a simmering civil rights conflict at the heart of trucking.
Swarmed by cameras, media, and truckers anxious to get some face time with trucking’s highest government official, the driver walked straight up to Duffy and presented him perhaps the strongest possible argument against the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s February rulemaking, which essentially bans non-domiciled CDLs for non-citizens.
In the moment, captured on video, Duffy appeared to side with the driver, saying he “shouldn’t” lose his CDL.
[Related: DOT reveals the real reason it's pushing out 200,000 non-domiciled CDL drivers]
However, Duffy has since informed Overdrive that DOT is indeed shutting down CDL eligibility for all non-citizens that don’t go through a specific visa process.
That includes this specific driver, who is a recipient of protections under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, a legal status for non-citizens that came to the U.S. as children.
The confrontation represents a microcosm of a larger battle playing out in court right now over the fate of the non-domiciled CDL ban. Another DACA recipient, Jorge Rivera Lujan, has sued FMCSA asking for a pause of the rule.
In the video below, see how the confrontation played out.
In case you missed something in the noisy video, here's our best shot at transcribing the encounter below [emphasis ours].
Driver: I’m actually a non-domiciled. I’m on the DACA. I’ve been here since 2001. I’m in jeopardy to lose my CDL.
Duffy: The problem is not that you’re non-domiciled CDL. We have rules in place in how the license should be issued. This is a space where you came into the country, you’re DACA, you’ve been here a while. If you came into the country and you’ve been here a year and a half, and a great way to make a living is to say, "I’m going to get a Commercial Driver’s License," and you paid and didn’t go through a school because it was a CDL mill, and you have a third party tester that didn’t actually test you for skills and you get a license, and I have people dying, I’m going to change the rules.
Driver: I totally agree.
Duffy: It’s not every non-domiciled CDL, what I’m telling you is a lot of the problems have been in non-domiciled CDLs.
Driver: And I’ve seen it for the last four or five years I totally agree with all that.
Duffy: The people that do things right and follow the rules, you’re not going to see problems. This is the subset where we’re seeing a lot of the issues in the country. So I’m going to clean it out and make it work.
Driver: Will it still affect us though? Because I’m in jeopardy of losing my CDL.
Duffy: Well, it shouldn’t.
While that exchange might sound like Duffy doing a 180 on DOT and FMCSA's long-stated position that only citizens, permanent residents, or certain visa holders should have CDL access, it's not.
That also shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone following the legal battle over FMCSA's non-domiciled CDL ban.
FMCSA has consistently stated that most immigrants don't come to the country with inspectable driving records, and therefore don't meet the same standards as U.S. applicants. Only visa holders go through "consular vetting," or having the State Department fully check their records.
DACA recipients like the one who spoke with Duffy pose an interesting challenge to that logic, because they have lived in the U.S. a long time and do have driving records to present to state DMVs.
Yet FMCSA's audit of states' non-domiciled CDL issuance practices found "systemic" non-compliance with federal regs, and seems to have completely lost faith in states' ability to process work authorization documents.
DACA recipients like the one in the video -- and Rivera Lujan -- still need those work authorization documents.
Overdrive reached out to Duffy and received the following clarification:
“The Department of Transportation’s new rule restores integrity and consistency to how non-domiciled commercial driver’s licenses are issued across the country. Moving forward, eligibility is limited to individuals in clearly defined visa categories where work authorization and identity can be reliably verified through federal systems. This ensures that every driver operating a commercial vehicle on American roads meets a uniform standard of lawful presence, accountability, and safety. FMCSA will continue working with states and federal partners to enforce these standards and keep our roadways safe.”
In other words, Duffy misheard or misspoke in the crowded, noisy fray of the MATS show floor.
However, while Duffy ultimately has been clear on DOT's position now, the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia will get final say on the argument between non-domiciled CDL holders and FMCSA.
The court's decision is due any day now.
[Related: FMCSA fully engaged with owner-ops: OOIDA | DACA-recipient CDL holders have hope?]
