Attorney General Clark Blocks Trump Administration's Unlawful Demand of CDL Drivers' Personal Information

Attorney General Clark and a coalition of 21 attorneys general announced a U.S. District Court judge granted a temporary restraining order that blocks the Trump administration from demanding the production of a database of state-owned records containing the sensitive personal information of 17 million drivers and from terminating more than $10 million in federal funding to the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators (AAMVA) if it refuses to produce the database.

Last week, Attorney General Clark and the coalition filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA), which is an administration of the DOT, and AAMVA, as well as an additional related lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The lawsuits claim the DOT, FMCSA and DHS are violating multiple federal privacy laws by secretly setting up their own database with records extorted from AAMVA, with no guardrails on the use or sharing of drivers' Social Security numbers and other personal information, and no notice to the public. The lawsuits also allege that the demand violates the Administrative Procedure Act because the federal government has no legitimate need to take over this database of state records, and it failed to consult the states before making this drastic change.

In 1986, Congress established the Commercial Driver's License Information System (CDLIS) to provide states an efficient means of sharing information about commercial driver's license (CDL) applicants and determining if an applicant is licensed in another state. Since 1988, the DOT has contracted with AAMVA, a private nonprofit organization, to operate CDLIS for the benefit of the states.

Attorney General Clark and the coalition will now seek a preliminary injunction to prevent the data from being turned over throughout the duration of this case.

Attorney General Clark filed these lawsuits with the attorneys general of Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin, as well as the state of Pennsylvania.