Professor Johnson Talks to S.F. Chronicle About White House Blaming Florida Crash on California Policy

Professor Kevin R. Johnson spoke to the San Francisco Chronicle for an August 18 story on the White House blaming California sanctuary policies for a fatal crash in Florida allegedly caused by an undocumented semitruck driver.

In a news release, White House staff called the truck’s driver, who lives in Stockton, an undocumented “Indian national who was granted a commercial driver’s license by the so-called ‘sanctuary state’ of California.” But as the Chronicle points out, the driver was granted a federal work permit, has an ongoing asylum claim that allows him to be in the country legally, and was issued a commercial driver’s license in accordance with federal law.

"An asylum seeker under federal law is eligible for work authorization six months after the application is filed,” Johnson told the newspaper. “I am not precisely sure what the Trump administration is arguing here.”

Kevin R. Johnson is a distinguished professor of law, Mabie-Apallas Professor of Public Interest Law and Martin Luther King Jr. Professor of Law. Johnson is the director of the Aoki Center for Critical Race and Nation Studies and also has an appointment as professor of Chicana/o studies at UC Davis. He served as dean of UC Davis Law from 2008 to 2024. Johnson is an internationally recognized scholar in the fields of immigration law and policy, refugee law and civil rights.