“Just last week, I joined attorneys general across the country to challenge the Trump Administration, yet again, for attempting to seize personal, sensitive data on commercial drivers, and now the court has put a stop to these unlawful efforts,” California AG Bonta said. “Today’s ruling marks another important step in making sure Americans’ privacy rights remain protected and resolute.”
California Attorney General Rob Bonta has scored an early win in a lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s demand for unrestricted access to commercial driver data.
In a press release, Bonta said that, on Thursday, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia agreed to grant the states’ request for a temporary restraining order. The order prohibits the Trump administration from enforcing or attempting to enforce its demand for access to the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators’ independently-operated database.
The database, as LegalReader.com has reported before, provides detailed personal information about drivers who either currently possess a commercial license or, in some cases, have simply applied for a permit. This information includes full names, license numbers, and other data that could potentially be used to locate drivers.
“Just last week, I joined attorneys general across the country to challenge the Trump Administration, yet again, for attempting to seize personal, sensitive data on commercial drivers, and now the court has put a stop to these unlawful efforts,” Bonta said. “Today’s ruling marks another important step in making sure Americans’ privacy rights remain protected and resolute.”
“When the President forgets the rules of the road,” Bonta said, “we’ll be there to remind him.”
The American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators, Bonta’s office notes, operates a federally-mandated system called the Commercial Driver’s License Information System (CDLIS). Individual states use CDLIS to search for specific individuals applying for a commercial driver’s license, required to operate large, heavy, or otherwise hazardous commercial vehicles. CDLIS lets states confirm, among other things, that persons applying for commercial permits aren’t already licensed in another state or subject to driving restrictions.
“The federal government has historically used the information system to search for records on an individual basis, but FMCSA has now threatened to withhold funding for AAMVA and terminate the cooperative agreement under which CDLIS exists and operates, subject to demands for the records of millions of people in the system — resulting in another dangerous attempt to obtain sensitive data,” Bonta’s office said in a press release announcing the lawsuit. “[The Department of Homeland Security], in coordination with [the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration], has issued a subpoena seeking these very same records. In the lawsuits, among other arguments, the coalition argues that these demands for CDLIS data exceed FMCSA’s and DHS’s authority, are barred by the federal Drivers Privacy Protection Act, and are barred by the protections of the federal Privacy Act.”
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