Alcohol and drugs
You are arrested for DUI and the officer takes your driver's license. What are you given instead, and for how long?
- A temporary driver's license, good for 30 days. Correct answer
- A temporary driver's license, good for 10 days.
- Nothing: your driving privilege is suspended from the moment of arrest.
Why
An arrest is not yet a conviction, and the handbook keeps the two apart at the roadside. The officer may take your license and give you a temporary one that runs for 30 days. California's Administrative Per Se law does require DMV to suspend your driving privilege after a DUI arrest, which is why the third answer sounds right, but the 30-day paper license is what the handbook actually describes handing over. Ten days is the other number in the same paragraph and it is the one worth memorizing, because it is a deadline rather than a permission: you have 10 days from the arrest itself to ask DMV for an administrative hearing, and the handbook says elsewhere that asking late means losing the hearing altogether.
Where this comes from
California Driver's Handbook, June 2025 edition. The correct answer is A temporary driver's license, good for 30 days.
The rule behind this one
California alcohol and drug rules for drivers goes through the whole topic, with the page of the California Driver's Handbook behind every rule.
More on alcohol and drugs
- You have been arrested for DUI and want a DMV administrative hearing. By when must you ask for one?
- You are 19 and a friend asks you to carry an unopened bottle of wine in your car. When is that legal?
- You are 16 and are convicted of riding a bicycle while under the influence of alcohol. What can happen to your driving privilege?
- Your doctor has prescribed a medicine that makes you drowsy. How does California's DUI law treat it?