An illegal alien truck driver struck a pedestrian at the intersection of E Raymond Street and I-65 in Indianapolis on the evening of March 6, leaving a U.S. citizen in critical condition. ICE arrested 25-year-old Sukhdev Singh at the scene that same evening after Indiana State Police responded, took him into custody, and contacted federal immigration officials.

Singh remains in ICE custody pending the outcome of his immigration proceedings. His victim was transported to a local hospital, where he remains in critical condition.

The case is the latest in a pattern of preventable tragedies involving illegal immigrants behind the wheels of commercial vehicles on American roads.

DHS Responds

DHS Deputy Assistant Secretary Lauren Bis did not mince words about the case:

It is common sense: illegal aliens should not be operating 18-wheelers on American highways. We are praying this individual makes a full recovery. It is incredibly dangerous for illegal aliens, who often don't know our traffic laws or even English, to be operating 18-wheelers on America's roads. Sanctuary governors like Kathy Hochul must stop giving illegal aliens driver's license before even more Americans get injured or killed.

According to Breitbart, that statement lands differently when you consider what federal investigators have been uncovering about how illegal immigrants end up licensed to drive commercial trucks in the first place.

A Licensing System Built to Fail

In December, DOT Secretary Sean Duffy warned that Democrat-run New York could lose $73 million in federal highway funds after an audit found that over half of the state's immigrant commercial driver's licenses were issued illegally. More than half. Duffy put it plainly during a briefing at the Department of Transportation:

When more than half of the licenses reviewed were issued illegally, it isn't just a mistake — it is a dereliction of duty by state leadership.

The numbers are staggering. Investigators found that New York had been issuing eight-year CDLs to individuals whose immigration documents expired in months. That means the state knowingly handed long-term commercial trucking privileges to people whose legal basis for even being in the country was about to vanish.

The DOT identified the core problem: while American drivers face strict checks through national databases for past violations like DUIs, reckless driving, and crash involvement, states lack the ability to access the driving records of foreign nationals and illegal immigrants. The result is a gaping hole in the screening process.

This loophole allowed individuals with dangerous driving histories to obtain a trucking license simply by presenting an Employment Authorization Document (EAD), which does not screen for transportation safety.

So a person whose driving record is completely invisible to American law enforcement could present a single document, skip every safety check that applies to U.S. citizens, and walk out licensed to operate a fully loaded 18-wheeler on the interstate. That is not a system with a flaw. That is a system designed without regard for the people it endangers.

The Body Count Keeps Growing

Singh's case is not isolated. A Chinese national named Huang Yisong, age 54, holding a New York-issued non-domiciled CDL, allegedly killed another truck driver while watching a video on his cell phone in a fatal bus crash in Tennessee. ICE officials have yet to disclose information about the immigration status of the Chinese man.

Most recently, reports indicated that a father and his 11-year-old son were killed in Ohio in yet another incident involving this broken licensing pipeline.

Each case follows the same arc:

• A state issues a commercial license without meaningful safety vetting
• An illegal immigrant or foreign national with an unknown driving history gets behind the wheel of a massive vehicle
• An American pays the price

Reforms and Resistance

In February, the DOT announced an updated regulation to stop dangerous migrant truckers from obtaining CDLs. The reforms aim to prevent foreign drivers who have not been subject to consular and interagency screening from receiving commercial licenses. It is a straightforward fix to a problem that should never have existed.

The question is whether sanctuary state leadership will comply or whether governors will continue prioritizing their political commitments to shielding illegal immigrants over the physical safety of their own residents. New York's audit results suggest the answer. When your state is issuing eight-year licenses on documentation that expires in months, you are not making administrative errors. You are making a choice.

And that choice has consequences that fall entirely on people who had no say in it. A U.S. citizen is lying in a hospital bed in Indianapolis right now because the system that was supposed to keep dangerous, unvetted drivers off the road failed by design.

A father and his 11-year-old son are dead.

The regulations exist now. The audit findings are public. The pattern is documented. Every illegal immigrant CDL issued from this point forward is not an oversight. It is a decision, and the officials who make it own what follows.