NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!
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.
FLORIDA AG ANNOUNCES PROBE OF SANCTUARY JURISDICTIONS THAT GIVE TRUCKING LICENSES TO ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS
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.
Singh was given a CDL test following the crash and failed, according to Duffy.
Duffy said Singh got his CDL license in California and Washington state before getting pulled over for speeding in New Mexico in July. Duffy said Singh’s rig was not taken out of service even though he could not speak English.
Duffy said the ELP rule went into effect in June, making it so that truck drivers who were not proficient in speaking English would be taken out of service. He added that California, Washington and New Mexico have hardly enforced the rule.
BLUE STATE INVESTIGATES HOW ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT TRUCKER GOT LICENSE BEFORE DEADLY FLORIDA CRASH
Jesse Elison, Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration chief counsel, said all three of these states will have 30 days to respond and present a corrective plan or else lose funding.
California could lose $33 million, while Washington and New Mexico could lose $10.5 million and $7 million, respectively, Elison and Duffy said.
Further steps could be taken should these states fail to comply, according to Duffy, though he declined to elaborate on the specifics.
“We don’t want to take away money from states, but we will take money away and we’ll take additional steps that get progressively more difficult for these states,” Duffy said. “There’s a lot of great tools that we have here that we don’t want to use.”
Read the full article here
