Veteran who TN insisted wasn't a U.S. citizen gets driver's license back

Two weeks ago, I told you about the Navy veteran who went to renew his Tennessee driver's license and get a Real ID, and was told he could no longer have a license because he was not a U.S. citizen — even though his paperwork proves otherwise.

Many people expressed outrage hearing his story and wanted to know whether the state had changed course and granted the license. It turns out, it hasn't. It's been weeks and he's still not able to drive.

David O'Connor is the 77-year old Navy veteran from Athens, Tennessee, we introduced you to earlier this month.

Previous reporting: State of Tennessee tells U.S. Navy veteran he's not an American citizen and cancels his driver's license

We asked him then, "You don’t have a driver ' s license?"

"No," he told us.

"But you had a drivers license?" we asked as a follow-up question.

"I did," O'Connor replied.

Bryan Staples / WTVF

As we reported then, the state of Tennessee took away his driver's license because state employees said he wasn't a U.S. citizen.

At that point, I shared O'Connor's plight with Jeff Long, Tennessee's Commissioner of Safety and Homeland Security.

"He (O'Conner) says he reached out to us because he just wants somebody to help him. Are you pledging you’ll do that?" I asked Commissioner Long.

His reply was, "Absolutely."

That was more than two weeks ago. Long told us that he'd help O'Connor get his license back.

"We’ll see what he did provide and what’s on record and help him, guide him to get whatever other documents he needs to get that fulfilled," Long told us.

This week, we asked O'Connor, "Do you have your license yet?"

"No," he said, adding that he has yet to get any of that help Long promised.

"What have you heard from the state since we ran your story?" we wondered.

"Nothing," O'Connor stated.

So now O'Connor has filed a federal lawsuit, naming Jeff Long in his official capacity as state commissioner over the department that handles licenses.

"This (O'Connor's situation) is ridiculous," attorney Gary Blackburn told me.

He is now representing O'Connor, and filed the federal complaint on O'Connor's behalf.

"What’s this man ever done except serve his country?" Blackburn said of O'Connor.

The suit states O'Connor should not "be deprived of the privileges of citizenship"...based "on the arbitrary and incorrect basis that he is not a citizen."

Photo submitted to WTVF

"The bottom line is, it’s not up to the Department of Motor Vehicles to determine whether a man is a citizen," Blackburn said.

What has O'Connor been doing in the meantime?

He's got a Social Security card and said he's voted in every state and federal election. He's also been driving for 61 years, with licenses from Vermont, New York, New Hampshire, and, most recently, Tennessee.

"It’s pretty frustrating," O'Connor told us in a conversation we had with him by Zoom.

O'Connor has now been without a driver's license for six weeks.

"You can’t do nothing by yourself. You have to have somebody take you wherever you wanna go. I'm pretty much stuck," he shared.

And right now, O'Connor said he and his wife, Jean, are stuck in Vermont where they came to visit family.

"We are here until I get a license because I can’t get on a plane to go back or I can’t drive," he said.

"I don’t know if my daughter wants that," he said with a laugh.

Jean O'Connor then chimed in.

"His great grandson, Henry, who is five years old keeps telling him, 'Pop, you are a citizen. Pop, you are a citizen.'"

The O'Connors said what's getting them through this ordeal is the support and words of encouragement they've been getting from people across the country, including many fellow veterans.

"Everywhere we go (we're hearing from people about the story). We went to a funeral last Sunday of a dear friend, and everybody there, people we hadn’t seen for years, everybody had seen it, heard it, and was outraged," Jean O'Connor said.

What led to the lawsuit?

The O'Connors said they hate that it's come to filing a lawsuit.

Their attorney said this easily could have been avoided had the Tennessee Department of Safety at the very least fixed its mistake once it was pointed out.

"Couldn’t they (the state) have done that?" I asked O'Connor's attorney Gary Blackburn.

"Yes, they could have. Certainly, the commissioner had that authority," Blackburn told us.

We had been waiting for an update from the state since we first did this story.

We got nothing until we reached out again as we were preparing to report this update. First, the department told us they couldn't comment on pending litigation.

And then minutes before the story was to air, we got word the state had reversed course and issued Mr. O'Connor a driver's license!

We are told it was delivered to his attorney's office as they were closing for the day.

I talked with the O'Connors just moments after they got the news and they are thrilled.

They are still moving forward with the lawsuit because they had asked the state to issue O'Connor a Real I-D. And they're still waiting for that.

Statement from the Department of Safety and Homeland Security:
The Department of Safety and Homeland Security has diligently reviewed Mr. O’Connor’s documentation and determined that he presented acceptable proof of US citizenship to obtain a Tennessee driver license, and a Tennessee driver license has been issued to him. Not all Tennessee driver licenses are REAL IDs, which is what Mr. O'Connor initially applied for. A REAL ID is a federally compliant license, and a combination of federal and state laws govern acceptable proof of citizenship to obtain a REAL ID. The documents that Mr. O’Connor has provided to date do not satisfy the proof required to issue him a REAL ID. The Department remains committed to working with federal partners to ensure that all US citizens in this state may obtain a REAL ID without undue hardship.