NEWYORK: The City of New York — as part of a coalition of five cities and counties from across the country — filed an amicus brief supporting petitioners in Lujan v. Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, challenging a federal rule that bars asylum seekers, refugees, and Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals recipients with work authorization from holding non-domiciled commercial driver’s licenses (CDL).
The rule affects nearly 200,000 immigrants who will be out of work. In the amicus brief, the coalition argues that the rule exacerbates a nationwide shortage of commercial drivers, which will lead to a disruption of the lives of residents and government operations, as well as threaten road safety in cities. In January 2024, the Adams administration first broke records for the most jobs in city history — six months ahead of schedule, which it has now done a total of 12 times.
For New York City to continue to grow its economy, job opportunities must be available for all New Yorkers, even those who are foreign born but still make up a major piece of the economy.
“Our administration has broken jobs record after jobs record because we were focused on delivering an inclusive economy that works for everyone,” said New York City Mayor Eric Adams.
“We are proud to work with our partners from across the nation to, once again, take action to support our immigrant sisters and brothers who want to work legally. Offering commercial driver’s licenses to non-citizens who are here legally has been a way to give people work, while also performing important street safety functions and moving our economy forward. Among a nationwide shortage of commercial drivers, this rule should be removed and immigrants should be able to legally apply to fill these important jobs.”
“This unlawful federal rule not only inflicts needless hardship upon hundreds of thousands of immigrants who are in the country legally trying to build better lives for themselves and their families, it also harms the broader public and should not stand,” said New York City Corporation Counsel Muriel Goode-Trufant.
Until this year, non-citizens who were in the United States legally could obtain a non-domiciled CDL.
In September 2025, however, the U.S. Department of Transportation (U.S. DOT) issued an interim final rule limiting those eligible for a non-domiciled CDL to those with H-2A, H-2B, and E-2 visas. The rule didn’t go through the required notice and comment period and relied on evidence that five non-citizen drivers were involved in crashes over the course of calendar year 2025.
Petitioners claim the rule is arbitrary and capricious in violation of the Administrative Procedure Act because the U.S. DOT offered no evidence of any connection between citizenship status and roadway safety.
Petitioners also argued that U.S. DOT failed to satisfy the good cause exception allowing agencies to forgo notice and comment, as it offered no evidence that an emergency or any public interest justified the rule. Petitioners have filed a motion to stay the rule in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
The coalition’s amicus — prepared by the Public Rights Project and Democracy Forward — highlights the harmful effects that the rule will have on local governments.
The coalition argues that the rule impedes local governments’ ability to provide essential services by exacerbating preexisting driver shortages.
According to the brief, those shortages have hit public bus operations particularly hard with 94 percent of transit agencies reporting, in 2022, that bus operator positions were among the most challenging to fill. The brief also states the rule undermines public safety as local governments depend on existing drivers to perform essential roadway safety functions, such as snowplowing. The brief further contends that additional financial strain will be placed on local governments as they pay more overtime to existing drivers and seek to pay more to recruit and train additional drivers.
Joining the City of New York, the Public Rights Project, and Democracy Forward were the city and county of San Francisco, California; the cities of Cambridge, Massachusetts and Albany, New York; as well as the county of Montgomery, Maryland.
