WASHINGTON — A government watchdog has launched an audit of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s oversight of state agencies to ensure English proficiency requirements are being met during testing for a commercial driver’s license (CDL).
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An audit notice posted on Friday by the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) stated that the goal of FMCSA’s national CDL program is to reduce the number and severity of crashes by verifying that only qualified drivers possess a CDL.
CDL testing, the OIG noted, is performed by either a state driver’s licensing agency (SDLA) or approved third-party testers and examiners, and FMCSA is responsible for verifying SDLAs’ compliance with CDL testing regulations.
“To obtain a CDL, applicants must show they are qualified to operate a commercial vehicle by passing both a knowledge test and a skills test, the latter of which must be administered in English per federal regulation,” the OIG stated.
Given the importance of the CDL program to ensure highway safety, “our objective is to assess FMCSA’s oversight of states’ CDL program compliance with regulatory requirements related to CDL knowledge and skills tests.”
The Small Business in Transportation Coalition, which represents owner-operators and small trucking companies, petitioned the OIG in 2022 for an audit of FMCSA’s CDL testing oversight due to what it saw were inconsistencies in regulations on English proficiency, but the watchdog declined to proceed.
A similar audit of FMCSA’s testing oversight conducted in 2002 found that federal standards and state controls “are not sufficient to defend against the alarming threat posed by individuals who seek to fraudulently obtain CDLs,” the audit report concluded.
“FMCSA has recognized the need to strengthen standards for State testing and licensing of commercial drivers and has increased the depth and frequency of its oversight reviews of State CDL programs. However, more can be done to broaden the scope of the reviews and improve the basis for the States’ annual certifications that their programs comply with Federal standards.”
Legislation introduced in June by U.S. Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kansas, would prohibit CDL testing from being administered in languages other than English.
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