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“What we’ve seen over the course of the last 10 years are a bunch of fraudulent CDLs out of Mexico allowing for immigrants to come in illegally,” Hawk said. (Hal Bergman Photography/Getty Images)

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Arkansas requiring foreign commercial truck drivers to have valid U.S. work authorization, demonstrate English proficiency and possess authentic commercial driver licenses while operating in the state.

The new law also criminalizes using false CDLs or driving with a valid foreign CDL without proper U.S. work authorization.

The bill, signed April 14 by Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, takes aim at what lawmakers and industry experts said is a spate of foreign drivers operating illegally and unsafely on U.S. roads, in some cases with dire consequences.

“What we’ve seen over the course of the last 10 years are a bunch of fraudulent CDLs out of Mexico allowing for immigrants to come in illegally,” said Arkansas state Rep. R.J. Hawk, who introduced the bill in the Arkansas House of Representatives, during a March hearing. “All we’re doing is helping cut down on fraudulent CDLs from other countries.”

The bill’s requirement for proficiency in English is aimed at ensuring drivers can read road signs.

“Representatives from the raised concerns to me about potentially seeking a legislative solution to address an emerging issue — fraudulent foreign CDLs,” Hawk continued. “Of course I was interested if I could help prevent individuals that weren’t properly trained or vetted from operating commercial vehicles on Arkansas highways. But the most important thing to me is that the legislation makes Arkansans and those who travel on Arkansas roads safer by getting individuals who are operating illegally, circumventing the system, and not abiding by the training and qualification standards off the road.”

Similar legislation was passed in Texas and took effect in 2023 to deter people from driving across the Mexican border with false CDLs.

Shannon Newton, president of the Arkansas Trucking Association, said she heard about foreign truckers with fake CDLs from her counterparts in Texas.

“The Texas Department of Public Safety found these fake CDLs being presented at roadsides. As Texas worked to crack down on them, it was only logical that they may also be being used in Arkansas,” she said. “The federal government needs to engage to help the industry be protected from unsafe, untrained drivers who are operating on our highways. We need immigration solutions. We need standardization solutions. And we need broader and consistent enforcement of the laws and regulations that currently exist.”

Enactment of the law was accompanied by impassioned testimony from individuals who lost loved ones to foreign drivers operating illegally on Arkansas roads.

Deann Miller lost her husband Scott in a crash after a driver from Mexico who did not possess a CDL lost control of a truck on a mountainous Colorado road, releasing steel pipes that crushed her husband and caused a five-car accident.

“My husband is dead today because the driver who killed my husband did not know how to drive. He didn’t have a CDL,” she said. “He didn’t know how to speak English and he didn’t know how to shift the truck properly in a mountain situation. I’m not discriminating against people but it’s just common sense. It’s important that they know how to read and speak our language. It’s not discrimination. It’s safety.”

The driver, Ignacio Cruz-Mendoza, had illegally entered the county 16 times and had past drug and alcohol convictions. He had served 293 days of a 364-day sentence for the crash before being deported back to Mexico.

Another widow testified that her husband died on May 13, 2024, after a head-on collision with a driver from Mexico who’d been driving illegally in the U.S. for 12 days and had no CDL.

“The company he worked for is a shell company; you can’t find who he worked for,” she said. “He didn’t speak any English. He can’t tell you how he was getting paid. You don’t know where he lived because he had a suitcase. But because of the negligence of government and of him, my kids now do not have a dad. It’s horrific and there should be more done. You should not be able to drive a commercial vehicle in the state of Arkansas if you can’t speak English. How are you reading the road signs?”

The new Arkansas law imposes a Class D felony carrying $2,500 to $10,000 fines and a possible sentence of up to six years in jail for having a false CDL. A fine for non-English proficiency is $500 for a first offense and $1,000 for subsequent ones.