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| AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta |
California, Washington and New Mexico face 30-day deadline after deadly Florida crash involving illegal immigrant driver
California, Washington and New Mexico may lose millions of dollars in federal funding if they continue to fail to enforce English language requirements for truckers, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy announced Tuesday.
Duffy said the three states have 30 days to comply with federal English Language Proficiency (ELP) requirements after an investigation into a deadly crash in Florida earlier this month revealed the states made significant failures regarding the illegal immigrant truck driver who made an illegal U-turn.
"This is about keeping people safe on the road. Your families, your kids, your spouses, your loved ones, your friends," Duffy said. "We all use the roadway, and we need to make sure that those who are driving big rigs — semis — can understand the road signs, that they’ve been well-trained."
Duffy referred to the deadly Aug. 12 crash involving Harjinder Singh, a 28-year-old who officials say hails from India and is in the country illegally.
Singh was operating a commercial semi-truck with a trailer on the Florida Turnpike in Fort Pierce when he allegedly attempted a U-turn in an unauthorized area before the trailer jackknifed and collided with a minivan, killing all three of its passengers, according to officials. --->READ MORE HERE
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California, Washington and New Mexico could lose millions of dollars of federal funding if they continue failing to enforce English language requirements for truckers, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said Tuesday.
An investigation launched after a deadly Florida crash involving a foreign truck driver who made an illegal U-turn on Aug. 12 found what Duffy called significant failures in the way all three states are enforcing rules that took effect in June after one of President Donald Trump’s executive orders. He said the department was also already reviewing how states were enforcing the rules before the crash.
Truckers are supposed to be disqualified if they can’t demonstrate English proficiency and Duffy said the driver involved in the crash that killed three should not have ever been given a commercial driver’s license because of his immigration status. But the crash has become increasingly political with the governors of California and Florida criticizing each other and Duffy highlighting the Trump administration’s immigration concerns in interviews.
But Duffy said Tuesday that it is a safety issue - not a political one - because truckers need to understand road signs and be able to communicate with law enforcement about what they are hauling if they are pulled over or what happened if there is an accident.
“This is about keeping people safe on the road. Your families, your kids, your spouses, your loved ones, your friends. We all use the roadway, and we need to make sure that those who are driving big rigs - semis - can understand the road signs, that they’ve been well trained,” Duffy said.
The Transportation Department said California has conducted roughly 34,000 inspections that found at least one violation since the new language standards took effect requiring truck drivers be able to recognize and read road signs and communicate with authorities in English. But only one inspection involved an English language rules violation that resulted in a driver being taken out of service. And 23 drivers with violations in other states were allowed to continue driving after inspections in California. --->READ MORE HEREFollow link below to a relevant story:
+++++New legislation takes aim at ELP enforcement, CDL issuance+++++
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