US threatens to withhold funding from states over truck driver English proficiency rules
The US Transportation Department said Tuesday, August 26, it will withhold federal funding from California, Washington state, and New Mexico unless they adopt English proficiency requirements for commercial truck drivers.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said the department could withhold about $50 million in federal funding if they do not comply in 30 days and could take further actions.
President Donald Trump's administration has taken a series of steps to address concerns about foreign truck drivers who do not speak English, and last week Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the United States was immediately pausing the issuance of all worker visas for commercial truck drivers.
While the English-proficiency standard for truckers was already longstanding US law, Trump's executive order in April reversed 2016 guidance that inspectors not place commercial drivers out of service if their only violation was lack of English.
REUTERS VIDEO
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00:00We are going to give these states 30 days to come into compliance with truck drivers speaking proficiently the English language or we're going to look at federal funding that they receive under the motor carrier safety assistance program.
00:18We at DOT and federal motor carriers, we are not going to tolerate states that don't comply with the rules that come from this department.
00:29And so we are going to, first of all, we've identified several states that have not been in compliance.
00:38That would be Washington, California, and New Mexico.
00:42Those are the three states that have not complied with this rule.
00:45And this is not, just to be clear, this is not just about saying we have some obscure rule that we want them to comply with that truck drivers speak English proficiently.
00:56This is about keeping people safe on the road.
00:59Your families, your kids, your spouses, your loved ones, your friends.
01:05We all use the roadway.
01:07And we need to make sure that those who are driving big rigs, semis, can understand the road signs, that they've been well trained, and that when they're pulled over by law enforcement, they're stopped by law enforcement, or there's a crash, and law enforcement responds, they can effectively communicate what they have on their rig.
01:30There might be a history that they have to be able to communicate to law enforcement when they're pulled over or there's an accident.
01:37And if they can't do that, that creates a significant issue for the traveling public.
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