Rep. Timothy O’Neal is pictured during a Policy Committee hearing in Harrisburg recently.

Several state House Republicans are backing legislation that would require PennDOT to periodically verify the immigration status of legal immigrants holding Pennsylvania driver’s licenses and photo identification cards.

Rep. Timothy O’Neal. Seven Republican House members – Jesse Topper, James Struzzi, David Rowe, Martina White, Clint Owlett and Sheryl Delozier – have signed on as co-sponsors already. The bill will need at least two Democrats to vote with Republicans in the tightly-divided House of Representatives, and it’s unclear if Gov. Josh Shapiro would sign the bill if it does pass the state Legislature.

The proposal comes about a week after it was announced that a suspected terrorist arrested in Kansas earlier this month is a licensed truck driver holding a driver’s license issued by Pennsylvania, according to federal authorities. Akhror Bozorov fled his native Uzbekistan after law enforcement there issued an arrest warrant in late 2022. The 31-year-old, not an American citizen, is accused of recruiting on behalf of an unnamed jihadist terrorist group and distributing its propaganda online. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security said Bozorov crossed the southern border in February 2023, where he was apprehended, released and given work authorization before receiving a commercial truck driver’s license in Pennsylvania in July.

“Not only is this prohibited generally under federal law, but Pennsylvania law only permits the issuance of a driver’s license to non-citizens if they can provide documentation to PennDOT demonstrating their lawful presence in the United States,” O’Neal wrote in his memorandum. “Additionally, Pennsylvania law generally requires PennDOT to re-verify a non-citizen’s immigration credentials only upon renewal of the license. Even more seriously, the fact that an individual in the United States illegally – and with reported ties to a terrorist organization – possessed valid identification which would have allowed them to enter sensitive areas, such as government buildings and airports, is a very real threat that should give all of us great pause.”

Sean Duffy, federal transportation secretary, has made it a priority to scrutinize how driver’s licenses are issued by states to immigrants since August, when a tractor-trailer driver not authorized to be in the U.S. made an illegal U-turn and caused a crash in Florida that killed three people. California and Pennsylvania were among states that received a letter from the federal government Nov. 20 threatening to withhold $75 million in funding if Pennsylvania does not immediately revoke what the administration claims are illegally issued commercial driver’s licenses to immigrants.

The Associated Press reported Nov. 20 that Pennsylvania’s transportation department officials said the department follows federal rules for verifying an immigrant applicant’s lawful presence in the country by checking the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s database. According to the Associated Press, Gov. Josh Shapiro suggested that DHS was falling short by failing to properly maintain that database, which states use to check an immigrant’s legal status before issuing a driver’s license to a noncitizen.

But Shapiro said the state transportation department checked the federal database over the summer before issuing a CDL to the man, and he was authorized to get one. The state rechecked the database the week of Nov. 20, and it still listed him as qualified to get a CDL, Shapiro said.

“They clearly are not minding the shop, and they’ve gotta get better, because every single state in the country relies on this database when making a determination as to who qualifies for a CDL. We relied on the feds before issuing this one,” Shapiro told the Associated Press.

Shapiro’s administration said the state transportation department ceased issuing commercial driver’s licenses to noncitizens after the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration published a regulation in late September that would severely limit which immigrants can get one, according to the AP.

O’Neal’s cosponsorship memorandum takes a different tone, saying the state should do more to periodically check the immigration status of those to whom it gives driver’s licenses or REAL IDs. Current state law would allow such a review only when a driver’s license is renewed, which in the case of Bozorov would have been 2029.

The AP reported California is poised to revoke about 17,000 driver’s licenses after completing an audit. O’Neal wants a similarly proactive approach in Pennsylvania.

“Pennsylvania law should not assume that an immigrant’s legal status remains unchanged for several years,” O’Neal wrote. “To this end, we will be introducing legislation requiring PennDOT to directly verify with DHS the legal immigration status of every non-citizen holding a driver’s license or photo identification card on a monthly basis. The intent of Pennsylvania law is clear; only US citizens and legal immigrants may hold a license in Pennsylvania, and we must ensure that legal immigrants retain their legal immigration status during the entirety of their licensing period, not just during the initial application period and at renewal. While DHS is responsible for maintaining and updating the federal Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) database, Pennsylvania should still do all that we can to ensure that something like this never happens again.”