Jorge Rivera has been a commercial trucker in the U.S. for more than a decade. So he was surprised when he went to renew his commercial driver's license last year in Utah, where he lives, and found out that he couldn't.
"It was like a slap in the face, because I've done everything the right way," Rivera said. "I've stayed out of trouble. I've been a law-abiding noncitizen, is what I like to say."
Rivera was brought to the U.S. illegally from Mexico when he was 2 years old. He's enrolled in the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, better known as DACA, which granted him permission to legally work in the U.S., among other benefits, and allowed him to get a commercial driver's license in 2014 and start his own trucking company.
"At this point, I'm just pretty much bracing for the worst," he said.
Rivera is part of a lawsuit seeking to block proposed regulations from the Department of Transportation. The changes were sought by the Trump administration, which wants to make it harder for immigrants with temporary legal status to get commercial driver's licenses after several high-profile crashes involving foreign-born drivers. But the administration's critics say that would do little to make the nation's roads safer.
By the DOT's own estimate, the proposed regulations would force about 200,000 immigrants out of the trucking industry. That includes asylum-seekers, as well as immigrants with temporary protected status or DACA.
"I don't know what I would do, to be honest with you," Rivera said of the possibility of losing his trucking license. "I even have my company name tattooed on my body," he said during a video interview. With his truck safely pulled off the road, Rivera showed off a tattoo on his arm with his company name and a freeway.
"Can you see the freeway, the mountains? The road is I-15. It's Utah, Colorado and Vegas," Rivera explained. "That's my route. That's what I do all year. You could tell me right now, a mile marker on I-15 or I-70 — you could tell me any mile marker in any state, and I could tell you what's there."
But even experienced drivers like Rivera could lose their licenses as the Trump administration's crackdown on immigrant truckers shifts into higher gear.
During the State of the Union address last month, President Trump urged Congress to pass a law named after 7-year-old Dalilah Coleman. Two years ago, Dalilah was severely injured when a tractor-trailer slammed into her family's car in California. Homeland Security officials say an immigrant from India who crossed the southern border illegally was driving the truck.
"That's why tonight I'm calling on Congress to pass what we will call the Dalilah Law, barring any state from granting commercial driver's licenses to illegal aliens," Trump said during the speech.
Republican Sen. Jim Banks of Indiana introduced a bill the very next day.
"The Dalilah Law not only bars states from giving CDLs to illegal immigrants, but it also revokes all trucking licenses that are currently issued to illegals," Banks said during remarks on the Senate floor.
To be clear, states are already blocked from giving commercial driver's licenses to anyone in the U.S. illegally. Immigrants with temporary legal status do need work authorization from the federal government in order to qualify for a CDL.
But the Dalilah Law, as well as regulations proposed by the DOT, would tighten those restrictions.
The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals put the brakes on the emergency version of those regulations last year. The DOT tried again, issuing a final rule that takes effect Monday.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy says that's necessary because state DMVs can't evaluate the driving records of immigrants who have not been thoroughly vetted.
"We don't go back and look at their driving record," Duffy said during a press conference last month. "So we have zero insight into the kind of people we're giving a commercial driver's license to."
Duffy called that "unacceptable," saying the administration wants to "increase those standards and make them all equal, increasing the requirements for a foreigner to get a commercial driver's license."
But despite some high-profile incidents, the Trump administration's critics say there's no data that shows drivers born elsewhere are less safe drivers than U.S. citizens or permanent residents.
"There's absolutely no evidence to support that claim," said Wendy Liu, a lawyer at the nonprofit Public Citizen Litigation Group, where she's leading the legal challenge against the proposed regulations.
"Everybody who gets a commercial driver's license has to pass all the same tests, has to do all the same training," Liu said during an interview. "Prohibiting them from having these licenses based on their immigration status just doesn't make any sense."
Liu says every fatal crash is a tragedy. But the right response is to get unsafe drivers off the road, regardless of where they were born.
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