Leaders of the U.S. Transportation and Homeland Security departments announced Monday that they are working together, alongside the Department of Justice, to crack down on truck-driving schools they say are operating fraudulently. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said he issued an emergency executive shutdown of 110 schools over English-language proficiency violations and another 160 for failing to meet DOT training regulations.
“We want well-skilled, well-trained truck drivers on American roads,” Duffy said during an event in Detroit with Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, Federal Trade Commission Chair Andrew Ferguson and U.S. attorneys representing the DOJ in Michigan, Illinois and Ohio. “If you’re not well skilled, you’re not well trained,” Duffy said. “If you’re not well licensed, you have no place driving an 18-wheeler, 80,000 pounds, on American roadways, endangering the safety of American citizens.”
Duffy called the 110 schools the “greatest offenders,” saying they accounted for 5,000 commercial driver’s license violations involving English proficiency. Since its establishment in 1937, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has required commercial drivers to speak and read English well enough to converse with the public, understand traffic signs and signals, and answer official inquiries, though the rule was loosely enforced before the second Trump administration. “We have schools that know the rule and still pass people through who can’t speak the language,” Duffy said. The other 160 schools lacked adequate training space or used unlicensed instructors.
FMCSA Administrator Derek Barrs said the agency and Homeland Security Investigations are auditing third-party skills testers hired by states. “Federal regulators require that commercial driver’s license skills testers must conduct this in English,” Barrs said. “However, that is not being done, and we’ve already cited almost 30,000 drivers who have been placed out of service for English language proficiency because they can’t even speak to law enforcement.”
Under “Operational Highway Shield,” HSI identified 1,000 fraud cases involving state motor vehicle department employees, including some accused of helping noncompliant drivers replace federal identification numbers on trucks. “We’re going to prioritize going after employees that are suspected of accepting payments to help illegals bypass driver’s license requirements,” Mullin said, adding that some workers allegedly take cartel payments.
The crackdown grew from the White House Task Force to Eliminate Fraud, launched in March to coordinate a government-wide effort against fraud, waste and abuse. “Real Americans are hurt physically every day because fraudsters are trying to make a quick buck,” said Ferguson, the task force’s vice chair.
