ALBANY – New York will no longer give commercial driver’s licenses to non-citizens following an order from the Trump administration tightening restrictions — but the feds are still threatening to withhold $73 million in funding unless all are revoked.
The State Department of Motor Vehicles finally confirmed that it would fall in line with the US Department of Transportation’s September directive to stop issuing commercial driver’s licenses and permits to many immigrants.
“New York’s non-domiciled CDL program has been paused since late last year, upon specific directive from the federal government. New York DMV is unable to process any non-domiciled CDL transactions as a result of that directive,” DMV Spokesperson Walter McClure wrote in a statement, first to Gothamist on Thursday.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy in December had warned the Empire State that it could lose out on million in federal dollars if it didn’t stop giving licenses to non-citizens. Duffy cited an audit of 200 New York commercial driver’s licenses by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration that found 107 were approved unlawfully.
But a US Department of Transportation spokesperson told The Post on Friday that the funding threat wasn’t off the table — saying the Empire State was still refusing to revoke the nearly 32,000 CDLs it had already issued to non-citizens.
The agency is demanding New York revoke all CDLs for non-citizens, even threatening to no longer recognize the commercial licenses altogether.
“Thanks to President Trump and Secretary Duffy’s leadership, we’re getting results. But until New York does everything required to get dangerous foreign drivers off our roads — including revoking all illegally issued licenses — they are at risk of losing over $73 million in federal highway funding and the potential decertification of their CDL program,” the DOT spokesperson wrote in a statement.
McClure, the state DMV spokesperson, didn’t deny that his agency hasn’t made any effort to even inform the thousands of migrant truck drivers currently on the road about the fed’s orders and the potential risks they could face in other states.
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A rep for Gov. Kathy Hochul’s office didn’t comment.
The federal DOT has been cracking down on liberal states like New York and California for letting migrants behind the wheels of trucks.
The feds revoked DOT guidance allowing non-citizens with federal work authorization to obtain CDLs last year.
The move came around the same time authorities in Oklahoma arrested a man with a New York REAL ID CDL listing his first name as “no name given.” The Department of Homeland Security later identified the man as Anmol Anmol, an Indian national, and said he’d entered the US illegally in 2023.
He now faces deportation, per DHS.
The issue was hoisted to the forefront in December, when another illegal immigrant from India, Harjinder Singh, was accused of causing a crash that killed three people in Florida.
Singh, it was later revealed, was unable to identify basic road signs during his CDL test in California and could barely understand English.
In a statement, the Trucking Association of New York State said it was supportive of Hochul’s move to pause giving migrants CDLs.
“Truck drivers are essential to our state’s economy and the movement of goods nationwide. Ensuring that CDLs are issued through a secure, accountable, and transparent process protects both the motoring public and the tens of thousands of professional drivers who operate responsibly in New York every day,” a rep for the association wrote.
