Privacy advocates and immigrant rights groups in California say they saw this coming.
For months, they warned Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration that sharing driver’s license data through a national verification system could expose undocumented residents to federal immigration enforcement. Now, following a federal subpoena targeting millions of commercial driver records, those warnings look prescient.
According to reporting by CalMatters journalists Wendy Fry and Khari Johnson, Newsom’s office and the California Department of Motor Vehicles confirmed earlier this summer that they would begin sharing driver data with a multistate verification network operated by the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators, a nonprofit known as AAMVA. Advocacy groups objected loudly at the time, arguing the arrangement could put undocumented Californians at greater risk of deportation should federal agencies access the information.
Their concerns proved timely. Just ten days after Newsom signed legislation authorizing the data-sharing arrangement, the California DMV learned that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security had already demanded records from AAMVA covering roughly 17 million commercial driver’s license holders nationwide — including full names, dates of birth and Social Security numbers. Less than a month after that, federal officials went further, issuing a formal subpoena to AAMVA for the information.
Ed Hasbrouck, who works with the civil liberties organization The Identity Project, didn’t mince words about the outcome. “We hate to have to say, ‘We told you so.’ But in this case, we told you so,” he said.
The federal push appears connected to a wider Trump administration effort targeting non-citizen commercial truck drivers. California officials have defended their participation in the data-sharing system, however, arguing that opting out could put the state out of compliance with federal identification requirements — potentially causing California driver’s licenses to be rejected at airport security checkpoints.
Newsom’s office has downplayed fears that the federal subpoena represents a broader privacy threat, echoing arguments it made earlier this year when critics first raised concerns about the data-sharing plan.
“The federal government’s demand … is for bulk access to (commercial license) data — not the individual searches that federal officials already conduct — and California has not provided the requested bulk data,” said Diana Crofts-Pelayo, a spokesperson for the governor.
Elsewhere in Sacramento, a bill that supporters describe as protection for small businesses from nuisance privacy lawsuits is drawing sharp criticism from consumer advocates who call it a giveaway to major technology companies.
State Sen. Anna Caballero, a Merced Democrat, authored the legislation in response to what her office describes as a wave of “frivolous litigation” under a nearly 60-year-old state surveillance law. Attorneys representing small businesses say more than 4,000 claims alleging privacy violations have been filed against companies in the past four years alone.
But national privacy organizations, including the ACLU and the Tech Oversight Project, argue the bill would strip individuals of their right to sue companies over unauthorized consumer tracking. The measure has drawn financial backing from Amazon, Meta, X and Google. Critics point specifically to a retroactivity clause in the bill that they say could undercut a high-profile ongoing privacy lawsuit against Meta.
In more encouraging news for California classrooms, the state Assembly passed a bipartisan measure clarifying how school districts can spend roughly $1 billion in arts education funding approved by voters through Proposition 28 in 2022.
That ballot measure required schools to use the new money to add to, not replace, existing arts programs. But confusion over how to comply led numerous districts to return their allocated funds to the state, fearing lawsuits if they misspent the money. Los Angeles Unified is currently facing exactly that kind of legal challenge, filed by former district superintendent Austin Beutner, who accuses the district of using Prop. 28 dollars to substitute for arts programs it had already cut. The district denies wrongdoing, and the case remains unresolved.
Beutner, who helped write Proposition 28, initially opposed the new clarifying bill but withdrew his objection after reaching a compromise with lawmakers.
Meanwhile, another attempt to regulate automated license plate readers has stalled in Sacramento. The bill, which would have placed new limits on how law enforcement agencies collect and share license plate data, died quietly this week before reaching the Assembly floor — the fifth such effort to fail despite growing public concern over the privacy implications of the technology.
Original source: CalMatters
