Tag Archives: CDLs

Making Our Roads Safer

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On Monday, Townhall posted an article about a move by Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy to make our highways safer.

The article reports:

One hundred ten commercial trucking schools are being shuttered following an emergency order from the Department of Transportation.

Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy said that the schools were responsible for “5,000 of the violations for English proficiency.”

“You have to speak English to operate a commercial vehicle. I didn’t create that rule; President Trump didn’t create that rule. That rule has been in place for a decade,” Duffy said during a Detroit news conference on Monday.

“We have schools that know the rule, and still pass people through their school who can’t speak the language,” he added.

“As of today, those schools are shut down,” he continued, noting that 160 schools were also shuttered for not being able to actually put hopeful truck drivers behind the wheel first, as well as “unlicensed instructors.”

“One school that we’re shutting down was so flippant […] their classroom was the school bus that was in the backyard. That was the classroom for which they were training new truck drivers,” he said.

According to AI, in 2025, it was reported that language barriers among truck drivers, particularly those who could not speak English, were linked to approximately 814 deaths annually in truck crashes. If you can’t read the road signs or understand the verbal instructions given to you in case of an emergency, you shouldn’t be driving in America.

The article concludes:

Duffy’s latest action is part of a new interagency agreement between DOT, the Department of Homeland Security and the Justice Department to crack down on the issue.

“These schools are passing off these CDLs to people who haven’t earned them– putting forty-ton weapons into the hands of people who are illegal immigrants who can’t speak English, and then they hurt real Americans,” Andrew Ferguson, chairman of the Federal Trade Commission, said.

There may be a shortage of truck drivers, but putting people behind the wheel who don’t speak or read English is not the answer.

Keeping The Roads Safe

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On Wednesday, Breitbart posted an article about a three-day operation, conducted by ICE and the Oklahoma Highway Patrol to make our roads safer. Truck drivers who cannot read, speak, or understand English are a safety hazard. Many of the warning signs on our roadways are electronic signs in English. Not being able to read these signs creates a safety hazard.

The article reports:

A joint traffic enforcement blitz along I-40 in western Oklahoma led to the arrest of 120 immigration violators—91 of whom were operating commercial vehicles. The arrests underscore the public safety risks posed by unlicensed or unauthorized drivers on America’s highways. The three-day operation, conducted by ICE and the Oklahoma Highway Patrol, targeted criminal activity and threats to roadway safety through intensified patrols and records checks.

In three days in late September, Oklahoma Highway Patrol Troopers and ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) officers made approximately 520 contacts. During the contact stops, ERO officers conducted records checks and arrested 120 illegal aliens. Of these, 91 non-domiciled drivers were operating commercial vehicles, according to information obtained from ICE by Breitbart Texas.

The article concludes:

Secretary Duffy said in his report announcement:

What our team has discovered should disturb and anger every American. Licenses to operate a massive, 80,000-pound truck are being issued to dangerous foreign drivers – often times illegally. This is a direct threat to the safety of every family on the road, and I won’t stand for it. Today’s actions will prevent unsafe foreign drivers from renewing their license and hold states accountable to immediately invalidate improperly issued licenses.

The secretary said California officials displayed “reckless disregard” in issuing CDLs without proper screening.

California must get its act together immediately or I will not hesitate to pull millions in funding. To every other state around the country – find all improperly issued CDLs and revoke their licenses now. We owe it to the American people to ensure only lawful, qualified drivers are operating big rigs on our highways.

He gave the state 30 days to come into compliance, or the federal government will begin withholding highway funds. California would lose approximately $160 million during the first year. The penalty would double in year two.

It’s time to enforce the law.