1,500 Truck Drivers Taken Out of Service for Poor English Following Transportation Department Directive

by Fred Lucas

Following new guidelines from Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy to enforce English language proficiency for commercial truck drivers, 1,500 drivers have had their licenses placed out of service by law enforcement, The Daily Signal has learned.

“‘America First’ means safety first. Americans are a lot safer on roads alongside truckers who can understand and interpret our traffic signs,” Duffy said in May at the signing of the guidelines. “This commonsense change ensures the penalty for failure to comply is more than a slap on the wrist.”

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, a division of the Transportation Department, has had longstanding English-language proficiency requirements.

However, in 2016, the Obama administration directed the agency not to enforce the English proficiency requirement.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration noted that the inability to read signs or speak English has led to fatalities. In January of this year, a non-English-speaking commercial driver was involved in a fatal crash in West Virginia and needed an interpreter for the post-crash investigation, according to the agency.

In 2019, a truck driver who was not proficient in English sped at almost 100 miles per hour through several signs that warned of a steep grade and dangerous curves. His actions led to a crash that killed four people, according to the agency.

Under Duffy’s May 20 guidance, commercial motor vehicle drivers who don’t comply with the English-language proficiency requirements will be placed out of service.

Within the first 30 days of the guidance being in effect, 1,500 commercial drivers were placed out of service.

In April, President Donald Trump issued an executive order that led to Duffy’s May guidance. The same day the executive order was signed, Duffy announced steps to rescind the Obama administration policy that dismissed English-language proficiency requirements for commercial drivers.

“That is why federal law requires that, to operate a commercial vehicle, a driver must ‘read and speak the English language sufficiently to converse with the general public, to understand highway traffic signs and signals in the English language, to respond to official inquiries, and to make entries on reports and records,’” Trump’s executive order says. “Yet this requirement has not been enforced in years, and America’s roadways have become less safe.”

Trump’s order continues: “My administration will enforce the law to protect the safety of American truckers, drivers, passengers, and others, including by upholding the safety enforcement regulations that ensure that anyone behind the wheel of a commercial vehicle is properly qualified and proficient in our national language, English.”

Trucking industry groups have supported Trump’s executive order.

“We thank the Trump administration for responding to our concerns on the uneven application of this existing regulation, and we look forward to working with FMCSA [Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration] and the law enforcement community on an objective, consistent, and effective enforcement standard,” said Dan Horvath, American Trucking Associations senior vice president of regulatory and safety policy.

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Fred Lucas is chief news correspondent and manager of the Investigative Reporting Project for The Daily Signal. He is the author of “The Myth of Voter Suppression: The Left’s Assault on Clean Elections.”

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