The Border Patrol says agents arrested 143 people, including 95 truck drivers described as undocumented immigrants operating with state-issued commercial driver's licenses, during a multi-day operation in Arizona.
The arrests were part of the Trump administration's ongoing crackdown on immigrant truck drivers who don't speak English proficiently or officials say improperly obtained non-domiciled commercial driver's licenses, and therefore pose a threat to public safety.
"Non-domiciled" applies to people from another country who are living in the United States and obtained commercial driver's licenses with valid work permits issued to people with temporary legal ties to the U.S. such as asylum seekers, Temporary Protected Status holders and DACA
recipients.
As part of the crackdown, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has been strictly enforcing English proficiency standards by immediately removing from the roads truck drivers who fail English proficiency tests during inspections. A new FMCSA rule also blocks immigrants with work permits issued to asylum seekers, Temporary Protected Status holders or DACA recipients from qualifying for non-domiciled commercial driver's licenses.
The rule limits non-domiciled commercial driver's licenses only to noncitizens with H-2A, H-2B and E2 visas.
The crackdown was launched following several high-profile fatal accidents involving immigrant truck drivers, but critics say there is no hard data that shows they are less safe than other drivers and is less about public safety than boosting arrests as part of the Trump administration's mass deportation campaign.
The crackdown also has resulted in a surge in harassment against truck drivers from India, especially Punjabi Sikhs, some of whom say they have been racially profiled by the Border Patrol.
The five-day operation from Aug. 10 to 14 resulted in the arrests of 143 people from 18 countries, officials from the Border Patrol's Yuma Sector said.
The arrests included 95 truck drivers the Border Patrol described as undocumented immigrants including 76 in possession of commercial driver's licenses issued in California, and six with commercial driver's licenses issued in New York. The remainder were from other states, the Border Patrol said.
Border Patrol agents also interdicted two human-smuggling events, which officials said resulted in the arrests of four people accused of being human smugglers, and 17 people who were being smuggled into the country, officials said.
Agents seized a firearm, 74 pounds of methamphetamine and 169 pounds of marijuana during the multi-day operation.
"We are committed to protecting our citizens from all international threats, whether that is from unlicensed or untrained drivers, or transnational criminal organizations engaged in human or drug trafficking," the Yuma Sector's Acting Chief Patrol Agent Dustin W. Caudle said in a written statement.
In May, Border Patrol agents from the Yuma Sector arrested 52 people during a five-day operation, including 36 immigrant truck drivers with commercial driver's licenses, officials said. Most of the truck drivers had work permits issued during the Biden administration and were no longer valid, Border Patrol officials said. The operation was dubbed Operation Checkmate.
Separately, the U.S. Department of Transportation announced Monday, Aug. 31, that it has closed 110 commercial truck driving schools.
The shuttered schools were associated with more than 5,000 truck drivers who failed English proficiency tests, the Transportation Department said.
A list of the schools provided to The Arizona Republic showed two in Glendale: Anet Transport LLC and State 44 Transport.
Anet Transport received a letter on Aug. 31 from the Department of Transportation notifying the business that its license to operate a driving school had been terminated, owner Yoan Martinez Trujillo said.
Martinez Trujillo called the termination unjust and said he plans to fight it because "everything is done properly."
The school opened in March and about 100 people have completed the school. The school has a mix of English and Spanish speakers, he said. But all the courses are taught in English and the instructors only speak English.
"Everything that is done at the school is in English, nothing is in Spanish," Martinez Trujillo said.
State 44 Transport could not be reached for comment.
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: 143 arrested in Border Patrol operation targeting truckers in Arizona
