Overview
- Effective Feb. 6, the FLHSMV now administers all knowledge and skills exams only in English, ending interpreters and non-English printed tests for every license class, including oral exams.
- Local officials, including Miami-Dade’s tax collector, say the change stems from a state executive order that counties cannot alter.
- Applicants who previously tested in other languages are being required to retake exams in English if randomly selected for a mandatory state reexamination before licenses are issued.
- One reported Miami-Dade case involved an applicant who passed in Spanish through an external administrator but was told to repeat the test in English after being selected for reexamination.
- Gov. Ron DeSantis backs the policy as a ‘good reform,’ while a PolitiFact review reports no studies linking multilingual testing to higher crash risk; more than 3 million Floridians report limited English proficiency.