The United States has paused issuing work visas for commercial truck drivers, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Thursday.
The move comes as the Trump administration seeks to crack down on non-English-speaking truck drivers and CDLs issued by states to an individual who does not live in that state.
"The increasing number of foreign drivers operating large tractor-trailer trucks on U.S. roads is endangering American lives and undercutting the livelihoods of American truckers," Rubio tweeted Thursday evening. "Effective immediately we are pausing all issuance of worker visas for commercial truck drivers."
American Trucking Associations President & CEO Chris Spear said his agency supports pausing work visas for commercial drivers and believes the issuance of non-domiciled CDLs needs serious scrutiny, including the enforcement of entry-level driver training standards.
"At a minimum, we need better accounting of how many non-domiciled CDLs are being issued," he said, "which is why we applaud Transportation Secretary Duffy for launching a nationwide audit in June upon our request. We also believe a surge in enforcement of key regulations – including motor carrier compliance – is necessary to prevent bad actors from operating on our nation's highways, and we'll continue to partner with federal and state authorities to identify where those gaps in enforcement exist.”
In the wake of a few deadly accidents this year, the spotlight on English Language Proficiency (ELP) has never been brighter.
CCJ sister publication Overdrive reported Thursday that White Hawk Carriers Inc., the carrier that employed Department of Homeland Security-dubbed "illegal alien" driver Harjinder Singh at the time of a triple-fatal Florida turnpike crash, has been shut down.
U.S. Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) launched an investigation focusing on Harjinder Singh and White Hawk Carriers. Preliminary results of the investigation, Duffy's office said, found that, when interviewed, the driver did not speak English, and that both Washington State and New Mexico violated FMCSA rules in granting licensure.
“If states had followed the rules, this driver would never have been behind the wheel and three precious lives would still be with us. This crash was a preventable tragedy directly caused by reckless decisions and compounded by despicable failures," said Duffy. "Non-enforcement and radical immigration policies have turned the trucking industry into a lawless frontier, resulting in unqualified foreign drivers improperly acquiring licenses to operate 40-ton vehicles."
A loaded semi in May struck four vehicles from behind that were stopped for a red light in the southbound lane of Highway 43 at the intersection of South Industrial Park Drive in Thomasville, Alabama. The driver of the truck and another man off duty inside the cab were in the U.S. on work visas and neither spoke English. Two people died in that wreck.
Just a few weeks earlier, President Trump signed an executive order that enforced an existing our of service rule that requires CDL holders in the U.S. to meet English-proficiency standards.
Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance (CVSA), as of June 25, added ELP non-compliance to its North American Standard Out-of-Service Criteria.
