The Transportation Department announced an emergency order Monday shutting down 110 big-rig driving schools that have been churning out what officials said were dangerous drivers — immigrant students who couldn’t speak English.
Another 160 schools have been told to suspend operations because they lacked the facilities to actually train drivers. One ran its school out of an old school bus, while others lacked enough space in their training lots to even perform truck turns.
Federal officials described the schools as driver mills, churning out people regardless of skills.
“We have schools that know the rule but still pass people through the school who can’t speak the language,” said Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy. “As of today, those schools are shut down.”
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said the issue was centered on the nearly 3 million unauthorized migrants the Biden administration allowed into the U.S. under its expansive use of “parole” authority. That’s a temporary permission to be here, despite lacking a legal visa. It usually carries a work permit.
Those migrants surged to commercial driving schools, which were eager for the customers and churned them out — but, according to the officials on Monday, many of the schools, and some states, ignored the safety requirements.
Mr. Mullin cited a highway sting operation in Oklahoma, launched after a deadly truck crash, that spotted more than 100 truck operators whose commercial driver’s licenses listed their identities as “No name given.”
“Meaning the people that was driving the truck didn’t have to offer their name. They were getting the CDLs straight out of California and New York,” Mr. Mullin said. “These individuals are dangerous and because of the failure of the previous administration, the Biden administration, they killed hundreds of people and unfortunately injured thousands.”
Mr. Duffy said tens of thousands of “illegal driver’s licenses” were issued.
Mr. Mullin said they’ve identified 1,000 fraud cases in trucking, from state employees illegally selling licenses to front companies that would take a truck that had been flagged, replace the Transportation Department ID number on the rig, then send it right back on the road.
“While they’re at a truck stop. There’s videos of it,” Mr. Mullin said.
The officials were joined by Dalilah Coleman, who in 2024 was 5 years old when the car she was in was smashed by an 18-wheeler driven by an illegal immigrant from India. She spent three weeks in a coma and is still receiving treatment for a traumatic brain injury.
The driver of the rig, Partap Singh, an Indian national, crossed the southern border in 2022 and was caught and released by the Biden administration.
The shutdowns are the latest in an ongoing campaign by the Trump administration against dangerous migrant truck drivers.
One earlier iteration involved withholding grant money from some states until they agreed to revoke licenses with validity dates that lasted beyond migrants’ parole periods. Mr. Duffy’s department also approved new regulations stiffening enforcement of the issue.
Trump opponents sued to stop the new rules. The federal appeals court in Washington has allowed the rules to remain in effect while the case is proceeding.
Mr. Duffy said they’ve identified 239 deaths on U.S. roadways tied to drivers who should have failed the English standard.
He said many of the drivers are “illegals,” but others came legally and still aren’t being trained.
He said governors could be more proactive in denying the unqualified students licenses, and in pursuing criminal cases against the fraudsters. But he said some states aren’t very cooperative.
“Oftentimes, they care more about an illegal driver than they do about American safety on American roadways,” he said.
But he said Homeland Security is committing its criminal investigators and the Justice Department is committing prosecutors to the issue.
Mr. Duffy warned drivers to get out before they’re found.
“Cut up your driver’s licenses and find something else to do,” he said. “Get off the road.”
He said the “fraudster” drivers are also willing to skirt other rules, such as hour limitations, which have been driving down wages for American drivers who follow the rules.
Mr. Duffy also warned shipping firms to do more to check the drivers they have.
“Don’t hire people who can’t speak English, can’t read English,” he said.
