New Mexicans can keep their driver’s licenses even if they fail to appear in court thanks to a new law that takes effect on June 16. Those who have had their licenses suspended due to a failure to appear will get their licenses back.
“What these types of license suspensions do is they force an impossible choice,” Monica Ault, the New Mexico state director for Fines & Fees Justice Center advocacy group, told KRQE. “You stop driving and you lose access to work and basic necessities. Or you keep driving, you risk more fines and fees, arrest, and even incarceration.”
New Mexico’s Motor Vehicle Division was legally allowed to suspend the driver’s licenses of people who failed to appear in court. The state could also suspend licenses for people who didn’t pay speeding tickets or other fines. Ault said according to the state’s Taxation and Revenue Department more than 300,000 New Mexicans had their license suspended for missing a payment or missing a hearing in a traffic case. “Essentially one in five licensed drivers have had their license suspended,” she said.
State lawmakers rewrote the rules surrounding license suspensions during the 2023 legislative session. The new law now prohibits the Motor Vehicle Division from suspending licenses for failure to appear in traffic court. All currently suspended licenses will be reinstated, for free, by September of 2023, per KRQE.
Critics say the new law will mean more people will ignore their appointed court hearing or fail to pay fines. “More drivers respond to the court when they are notified of the potential license suspension than the notice that a bench warrant has been issued,” Barry Massey, a spokesperson for the Administrative Office of the Courts told KRQE News 13. “Bench warrants tend to drive people away from the courts. Now, when a person fails to appear in court, the only option the court has is to issue a bench warrant.”
Ault said that even without the ability to suspend licenses, New Mexico’s courts still have tools to ensure compliance. The new law doesn’t eliminate any debt from unpaid fines, which should be an incentive to comply and pay. License suspensions impact rural New Mexicans more than city dwellers, according to research from the Fines & Fees Justice Center. A survey of 511 New Mexicans revealed that those from rural and semi-rural areas were 31% more likely to have their license suspended due to court issues than New Mexicans from urban areas.
Part of the challenge for rural New Mexicans is that they might not always know they’ve been ordered to come to court.
