This is America's Trucking Network with Kevin Gordon.
Welcome board, Thanks for tuning in on this final day of October. Happy Halloween to each and every one of you. Tonight, in a lot of places, the trick or treaters are going to be out there, and so let's be careful out there because these kids on Halloween, they're more interested in getting the candy than paying attention to traffic. And so if you're in a particular neighborhood, be aware the kids may be darting out in traffic. And let's have
a very safe Halloween and trick or treat. What is really scary, especially as far as the Halloween Melissa, the hurricane Melissa is still wreaking havoc down on the Caribbean. Looking at some of the pictures from Jamaica and the film reports of people being able to get in there and the absolute devastation radible down there, and it's going to be a long time till they recover. Currently, Melissa is over Bermuda, and of course we'll get more information
on that as it passes. But what we're also seeing is that on the in the upper Northeastern area, we're getting on a lot of rain and it's an unusual strug Well, actually it's the outlying area of the storm from Melissa, because normally the weather, if you know, we get weather from the north and northwest, west and northwest, i should say, and this storm is actually coming from the northeast and the east, which is unusual. And so they're getting an awful lot of rain in the northeastern
and along the coast of the Atlantic coast. So if you're in the area there, be aware that the that the weather is going to be very rainy and windy, and be careful out there.
Again, getting home is job one.
So if you see any conditions that are different than what is being told about or talked about on your weather app or weathermen or whatever you're listening, to make sure you let the people behind you know if you're encountering something that's unusual, and hopefully the people in front of you will let you know. Because there's an awful lot of wind and a lawful lot of rain. Now they're talking about in certain areas that they're experiencing fifty
sixty mile an hour winds now. Once you get up above fifty five miles an hour, that is technically hurricane conditioned, so they are still even though they're on the outside area of the cone of where this storm is going, because Melissa currently on its track is heading north east away from the coast of the United States and Canada. But the outlying storms as a result of that is what's causing a lot of wind and rain. So technically they're not in a hurricane area there, but the winds
are awfully high. We did see and we mentioned yesterday that there's been I think up to now five structures on the west on the Cape Hatteras in that area buck Buck what is it, Buxton, South Carolina, where these houses are built near the beach and on the beach basically, and they're on these stilts, which is supposed to take care of any of the waves and also the high tides, low tides and so on. But with these winds coming in and the waves hitting this, it's knocked out those
stilts and these houses have collapsed. So it's up to five now currently. We had twelve structures that were destroyed a couple of weeks ago, so now up to about seventeen structures that have been destroyed. So be careful out there and make sure you get home safe and make sure that, as I said, getting home is job one. President Trump wrapped up his week long visit. I guess Asia trip is what they're week long Asia trip, I
should say. And if you see what happens, if you look at what happened, it was absolutely amazing and a tremendous success. Of course, the spoon fed regurgitators in the mainstream media aren't going to talk about it very much or talk about it in very high praise. But if you looked at the pomp and circumstance that he was welcomed in Malaysia, in Japan, in South Korea, how they
rolled out the red carpet for him. When you see the way that the new prime minister from Japan, and I know I'm going to butcher her name, but I'm going to give it a shot.
Here.
The Prime Minister, SHANEI. Takiyachi is her name.
Now.
Not only was she exuberant being on stage with President Trump during his visit when he was speaking in front of the troops, but she has also recommended him, along with some of these other countries, have recommended him for the Nobel Peace Prize for the peace that he's brought around the world and across the world. So there's up to several different countries now that have written letters nominating him for the Nobel Peace Prize. Just kind of a
rundown quickly, is what's going on. But of course USA Today and the spoonfeeder regurgitators of the mainstream media, they'll deal with. The headline says trade deals, pageantry and nuke's seven takeaways from Trump's Trump's trip to Asia in their sub headline, Trump's week long trip to Malaysia, Japan and South Korea showcase the pageantry of foreign affairs against the backdrop of government shutdown at home that threaten to become the longest heir ever. And of course they don't mention
that it's the Schumer shutdown. They don't mention that it's the Democrats holding this up. There is a recording of one of the Democratic senators talking about that, yes, people are going to be feeling pain, but this is the only levers we have and the only control that we have in Congress and in the Senate. So yes, all they have to do again what they did back in March. They signed this continuing resolution that kept things going, kept the government open until they negotiated some of the other
deals and so on. But what they're holding out for now, there's this clean resolution that's there.
Been sitting on the table.
They have voted on it thirteen times, the Democrats have voted against it thirteen times, and they are still shutting down the government. And what they're holding out for is one point five trillion dollars in additional spending above and beyond what this clean resolution is.
And that's not the way you do things in Washington.
And they are going to pay a tremendous price for this because people are not buying into the crap that they are pushing. And some of the polls are indicating that even though the spoon fed regurgitators in the mainstream media are saying one thing, the people that are being pulled realize something completely different and having a different reaction
than what they would hope them to have. Trump reduced a China tariffs that he met with the jijingping there in South Korea and they did hammer out certain agreements. There's going to be a lowering of teriffs in exchange for China purchasing agriculture and electronics trade. Trump has lowered
South Korea tariffs in exchange for US investment. Trump also announced, Now in this story, they said, announce the resumption of nuclear weapons testing, and they go into this whole scenario talking about how this is an aggressive on Trump's part and that this is kind of adding to the arms race.
However, what they failed to.
Mention is the fact that Vladimir Putin has decided that he is going to up the ante a little bit. And again is Phil Flynn points out in his Energy Report, Russian President Vladimir Putin made a mistake by unintentionally starting a new arms race.
US afree tested.
A new nuclear capable, nuclear powered, long range remote torpedo that he claimed was experts have dubbed the doomsday machine. Now, with him doing that, Trump is indicated that he's going to balance that off and renew nuclear testing on the part of the US because we have the largest and he's been very reluctant to do any testing as far as nuclear weapons and trying to promote peace and actually reduce the number of nuclear weapons. But if Russia is going to amp this up, of course we're going to
amp it up. Also coming up, we're going to be talking to Louis Pugh. I want to mention that real quick. We're going to be talking about, of course, Louis Pugh, executive vice president of oh IDA Owner Operator Independent Drivers Association. We're going to be talking about a couple of pieces of legislation pending before Congress, the Non Domicile CDLs and English Language proficiency.
There's a lot of things.
Going on in this and one, you know, I don't know how long the interview is gonna go, but we're going to go as long as we can because there's a lot of issues here and a lot of things that's not getting accurately reported in the media. But we'll get to all that coming up. I'm Kevin Gordon, America's Trucking Network, seven hundred WLW.
I need.
This is the briefing reward on America's Trucking Network on seven hundred WLW.
The Infinity Series Champion will be crowned Saturday night in Phoenix. Connors Zilich, Carson Gwaffle, also Justin Algeyer and Jesse Love are in the Ecinity Final four. Danny Hamlin, who will run for the Cup Series twenty twenty five titles Sunday on Dirty Wild media on his pick for the Exfinity champ.
The seven car last year was very, very dominant. You gotta think he's going to be pretty tough again, But you also got the eighty eight.
I think it's still going to be a close one.
Justin's experience at Phoenix will counter whatever success the eighty eight has had throughout the season, and so I think that's going to be a one A one B type of race, and then Jesse will be right there near them, and then Carson is going to need to find some speed. Who's your pick? Then I'll give the nod to Justin. His car is going to be just as prepared as the eighty eight. He's not going to get beat on equipment.
Remember last year all the mistakes he had and to still come backing. Yeah, they're lightning fast. Justin's my pick.
Sam Meyer has been suspended by NASCAR from Saturday's Exfinity Series race at Phoenix after wrecking Jeb Burton on the cool down lap last weekend at Martinsville. Colleague Racing will pause its Exfinity Series program for the twenty twenty sixth season. Since debuting in the series full time in twenty sixteen, colleague has won twenty seven races and ten seasons, including a pair of regular season championships from aj Allmendinger in twenty twenty one and twenty two.
This is the racing report on America's Trucking Network on seven hundred WLW, Say Dennis the reporting.
For a t N on the podcast Health Stuff. We are tackling all the health questions that keep you up at night. I'm doctor preon Gwalia double.
I'm Kevin Gordon, America's Trucking Network, seven hundred WLW. I want to welcome back to the friend of the show. Been on this show a couple of times, a good friend of the show. Louis Pugh, Executive vice president oh IDA, owner Operator, Independent Drivers Association.
Louis, how are you welcome back to the program.
Hey, it's good to be on your program. It's good to be back on here again.
Yeah.
I'll tell you what, It's always a pleasure having you. There's been a lot of things that have happened since the last time we talked. One of the issues we talked about back then was the English language proficiency issue, and that has really come into the forefront now. But also one of the things that has also crept up as this non domicile worker. So I think non domicile CDLs. So let's begin with that and kind of give us
a background on this and what's going on. I understand there's a couple of bills before Congress, one on the ELP and the other one on non domicille CDLs, so kind of bring us up to speed on all that.
Yeah, I mean, it's you're right.
There's been a lot of talk, especially this year with the English science proficiency in the non domicile. The non domicile stuff started back in twenty six.
Or twenty nineteen. I think they were ata of course at petition.
Wanting that, and that was mainly it was designed to allow people from out from one state to go to another state to get their CDO. And what happened though, is the way it worked out, it opened up the floodgates to where people from other countries could come get their CDO.
And that's what we've been seeing happen.
Is all these people from all over the place are common and then unfortunately states some some states, I should say, they just sort of opened the door let anybody.
They don't even know who they're giving.
Them to it seems like. And so fortunately the Trump administration and dot has listened to us because we have been yelling and complaining about this for a while now and they finally started paying attention and and they've done somethings. Secretary Duffy came out with that internal Final intern intern Final rule that came out on these non domicile CEOs to where they had to stop ascatonin states to stop issuing them.
And then so we've had that happen. We've also had the English language go into the out of service thanks to this. There's been a lot of stuff.
Done now as far as the non domicild is concerned. Okay, non domicilde you mentioned had to do with trying to get you know, people what Ohio, somebody in Ohio being able to Indiana and so on, and then they open this floodgates to people coming from outside the United States.
Do I have that correct?
Yeah?
That's what it was designed for, your correct, was to allow people within the United States to or you know, from one state or another. That's what they're wanting it for.
And you know, of course courting, it's that thing about all this.
This all goes back to this bullshit driver shortage narrative that we continually have had to fight against, the pushback against, because for years and years, you know, for forty years, Big Trucking, American Trucking serisays and continues to say, we have a driver shortage.
We've never had a driver shortage. But it's all to keep wages low. And this was just one more regulation that they were able to.
Get put out there at it's non domicile in the.
Name of driver shortage.
Now we do air this show after midnight, and we are in that comfort zone where you can use certain colorful language, but we prefer not to use the wholt bs if you know what I mean. Yes, full excrement there we go.
But yeah, I.
Mean, and it makes it kind of more comes into focus. You know, you had these HB one or H one B visas where people were allowed to come into the country if you did not have a particular if somebody had a particular skill that wasn't able to be done by a domestic a Native American or not a Native American, but a person that is a US citizen. And then they expanded that to consulting firms and they abuse the heck out of the system. I guess this is another
leg up of that. And then, as you said, the American Trucking Association's claiming that there was a driver shortage when in fact there wasn't and got this ram rodded through and in effect, just to repeat for everybody, this has pushed down wages because if you've got a flood of people, people that will work for a lot less because they're really not a citizen in the United States, that would then press down or pull down the wages themselves.
Correct, Yeah, correct, I mean trucking salaries for truck drivers have not kept up with inflation since the nineteen seventies, and when you have a shortage of something, prices go up.
So if we had a trucking or driver.
Shortage, driver's salaries and wages would be off the charts, But we don't because we keep litigating, you know, from this driver shortage narrative was what we've done for forty years, and that's why we're in this mess that we're in. Well, we have a shortage of is pay and training and parking. Those are three things we have a shortage of. And you know, we're in the longest recession in trucking history. Why because we have too much capacity, too much capacity
of too many truckers and too many trucks. That's why the rates aren't coming back. And you know, the big carriers and folks say they have a business model using very cheap salary and cheap way is and the only way they can do that, as my boss said, Todd Spencer, our long time our president said, when the job sucks, you got to find more suckers. And unfortunately that's what they're trying to do. That's why we see this push for one hundred and twenty one drivers, this push for these non domiciles.
All this stuff is for cheap labor.
Now, as far as a non domicilet is concerned, if somebody is here legally I guess through a green card or whatever, and they have a work permit, that would not prevent them from getting a CDO license.
Correct, well, yes and no kind of now right now, it's the way the rule has been written.
You are correct. You could be here, you have to be here. You can have an HP t V srawone, but you have to go through all this stuff to get that things properly.
F and CSA stepped in put.
This IFR out to where this has to be. So really, what it's going to amount to is a few agricultural workers out here and very few from are going to you know, could possibly get CDLs the hall stuff from field to farm or something like that.
From the research we've seen the.
Carve out that's in this if R that Trump and Duffy put in the amount of.
There's only been six thousand of the.
CDOs put out to those kind of people.
Since two thousand and nine till now, so that's hardly anybody, right exactly, I've heard of anyone, but what we've been saying Louis Pugh, by the way, we're speaking with Louis Pugh, executive vice president of Oheida.
What we've seen though is that some of these people that are that have these work visas, they will expire and within like say they're at the point where they're going to expire with say within a year, they will get a CD license that is good for how long? Is it good for four years? Is it have to be renewed every year? How how often does and two?
Until this i f R came out in September, you're right there with the cdo may last longer than their work visa.
That's that's why you.
Don't have so technically want to see, so technically once their visa runs out, they should not be permitted to be driving. They that basically, even though they have a cd L, it actually becomes null and void because they don't have the permit to work in the country.
Correct, you are correct, and that's the way it was prior to the i f R in September. Okay, but there's still probably people that they're running around with these because you know, when rules and regulations are passed there from that point forward, they're usually not retroactive. So if there are some see undone nomoso CDOs out there like this, they don't really they're don have to do some checking her to go back and get rid of them.
With the way the law works, whether.
They can or can, it's kind of a state thing since the i f R came out. The way it works now and the way it should have been before. But the way it will work for now with the i f R is that your CDO would be good for one year or till the ex visa expires, whichever is first.
And that's part of this legislation.
Correct, that's part of the I f R and the Duffy and Trump put out.
And now since then, you know, there's some truckers out there. I don't think I'm.
Quite ready to understand it, but because they're getting all mad. They were happy with what Trumping Duffy put out. But now Congressman Rouser has a bill out there that would cod codify this because.
Right now it's a ruling.
This a good place for us to take a break, because we had to step out and we'll pick this up on the other side. Speaking with Louis Pugh, Executive vice president o AIDA, owner Operator Independent Drivers Association, I'm Kevin Gordon, America's truck in Network seven hundred WLW.
News, Traffic and Weather.
News Radio seven hundred WLW Cincinnati.
Meet the new Ohio congressional map with your twelve thirty report.
I'm Travis Lair.
Breaking now, the state's redistricting Commission is set to approve a plan that looks almost identical to the one the Supreme Court struck down in twenty twenty two for unfairly favoring the GOP. Democrats spent months pushing a seven to eight map that they said reflected Ohio's recent voting history, while Republicans never offered one of their own. Just last week, Democrats threatened a referendum if Republicans drew the lines alone. Now they're supporting a deal that avoids one, but they
haven't said why. The map was posted online only after the meeting began, leaving the public no time to comment. After gears of court fights and promised reforms, the final product brings Ohio right back to where it started. You can see the map on our X feed at seven hundred WLW.
On the way to Friday morning, we've got clear skies, colder morning low of thirty nine. Now as we look at the rest of the day on Friday, we're partly to mostly sunny, a high of fifty five at night, fair skies in a low down to forty. Right now, there's a slight chance of a shower on Sunday. From your severe Weather station, I'm nine First Warning Chief Meteorologist Steve Rowley, News Radio seven hundred WLW. On Sunday afternoon,
we're looking at the little light rain. It'll be about fifty two degrees when the Bengals face the Bears at one o'clock. Here at pay Corpse Stadium. We'll have that game for you right here on the home of the best Bengals coverage. This game day forecast built by American Home Tech. A strong defense starts with a solid roof American home tech dot Com. It's thirty seven degrees right now.
Hamilton County commissioners have rejected a plan to expand local property tax exemptions, saying the move would have cost schools and local services more than thirty four million dollars a year. The optional tax breaks were authorized under a new state law, but would not have been reimbursed by the state. Commissioners said the change would have shifted costs away from the
state and onto counties and school districts. Cincinnati Public Schools alone stood to lose about seven and a half million dollars, equivalent to dozens of teacher salaries, at a time when many districts are already cutting staff to close budget gaps. Lee Mawen, let's talk about sports, Buddy seven one hundred WLW.
Sports Joe Flacco gets in a limited practice Thursday. Bengals signed linebacker Joe Gile Harris to the active roster. Also defensive tackled McKinley Jackson requests for a trade or his release Night hosts the Bears Sunday afternoon one. The Cyclones fall to the Indie Fuel two to one. John Jarwarski scoring the low goal since Night now two and two and traveling to Bloomington Saturday night and the field hockey
semi final. Thomas Worlington won Mountain Notre Dame zero. Cougar's finished the year thirteen and eight.
Thank you, Lee Mawen.
You'll hear from Lee at our next update at one o'clock. You'll have breaking news anytime. I'm Travis Laird News Radio seven hundred WLW. As a party and you're packing the free iHeartRadio app live radio playlists for everything in the most podcasts on the planet, and.
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From the rest of the country, and the try suit overnight will dry out up your rain. The past two days partly cloudy, the load down to thirty nine, mostly sunny both Friday and Saturday, highs topound in the upper fifties. A chance of really rain Sunday, otherwise mostly a HI fifty seven. Nationally, heavy rainfall expected to continue into FODI
for upstate New York and the New England states. Meanwhile, heavy rain will be seen over the Northwest on Halloween and in two Saturday trick or treating will also be what for the Upper Mississippi Valley. Below average temperature is expected across areas east of the Rockies, while above average temperatures are forecasts from the Rockies to the west Coast.
Seven hundred is wlw IM Kevin Gordon. This is America's trucking Network. Continuing our conversation with Louis Pugh, Executive vice president o AIDA, Owner Operator Independent Drivers Association. Before the break, Louis, we were talking about this IFR Interim final rule. Now, this is a mandate or a rule put in by the Department of Transportation, and as I understand this, it is something that well, all right, this is like an
executive order at this point. With a new administration, this could change or it could be well probably more relaxed or whatever. So there is no need by Congress to step in here and codify a law that allows us to continue beyond any administration, which is right for the trucking industry.
Correct? Do I have that right?
You are a hundred correct, Gordon.
Now, Congressman David Rouser introduced this bill.
Talk about this bill and what it does.
Yeah, well, and again it's a misinformation out there and there's a few cisal media people going crazy and stuff like that.
All that that doesn't happen. Come on, you people on social media. They don't lie and misrepresent stuff.
Come on.
Yeah, yeah, right, Well anyway says it makes lots of people experts, Yes, anyway, but what what what I know? What what it does is all the Rouser Bill does is it codifies the the i f R that was put out by the Trump administration and Duffy, which was That's why I find this fascinating because the people who are now picking on the Rouser Bill, when this came out from.
DOOT, they were celebrating.
They were all happy about it. And we need this bill to pass.
I mean, I can't.
You gotta remind people Congressman Rouser is actually the chair of the Highway Transit Subcommittee and the House T and.
I, so he's the guy.
That kind of is where trucking bills are gonna He's gonna have to check off and it's his bills. So this bill is the one that probably stands the best chance.
Of moving forward.
But again, his bill does nothing more than make it a law, which what the FMCSA and DT made a rule. They would make that rule of permanent law and a good thing. Like you said, then another administration comes in, they just can't roll it back. It would take a congression out of Congress to move to change the law.
I was just get's like the eleds for folks out there. We got elds. The only way you ever get rid of eods.
It takes a act of Congress because it was mandated by Congress in the first place.
Okay, we're speaking with Louis Pugh, Executive Vice President ADA. Now this is a great point and people need to get behind this. So they need I guess once again, we got to put the call out to people to call their congressmen, their senators and get them on board with this because otherwise this, as we saw with all so many other pieces of legislation that we've seen over the years, it just gets stuck in Congress, gets turned in the bin and never gets to the house floor.
You know, sits on the present, you know, sits in Congress, sits in the Senate, never goes forward and so on. So I guess the pressure has to come from the people, because again with the different accidents that we've seen, the fatalities that we've seen, the fact that we don't have a driver shortage, which you know, is creating a problem as far as depressing the wages, having an overcapacity, and having people on the road that necessarily aren't trained properly
in order to drive this eighty thousand pound vehicle. This would basically make our roads safer. And you would think that people would be interested in making our roads safer.
Well, you would think so. I mean, that's the thing I tell people. All these bad rules and regulations.
And all these bad things that's been passed due to drivers. Yes, we're paying for this on America's highways. And we've seen that tenfold here lately with these accidents where the guy made the turn in Florida and then what happened down here in California, and.
You know, and it's just real sad. I mean, that's a sad thing. About these folks. They should have never got.
Behind the wee overtruck in the first place, because they should have never gotten through training.
Right now, we have this two pronged issue that people that have been in the news a lot, the English language proficiency and this non domiciled worker. And I think, in my opinion, it seems that the emphasis should be on the non domiciled workers because those probably are the people that aren't passing the English proficiency. So if we cut that off, then we don't it just kind of
like a chicken and the egg type of thing. I think we need to start with the non domiciled workers first and then make sure that we're making sure that those English language proficiency, which is which well that was already in the law, and that's already been passed by Congress, which was ignored from twenty sixteen on.
Correct.
Yeah, I mean, unfortunately, I guess you wouldn't say it's ignored.
It was. There was still a violation, and you're right, it has a law English science proficiency.
We shouldn't even be having to talk about it because it should have never been a problem in the first place. Unfortunately, there's not strict enough training standards out here, not strict enough checks and balances.
In the training for truckers, and.
Unfortunately, there's been a lot of less than a rep veritable trucking schools that come out here and they training these people when they have their third party testers and they get them their cdo and they're when they're not capable of speaking our language well enough to.
Drive a truck. And that's what's caused all this. But you are correct. From twenty sixteen until till June of.
Twenty twenty five of this year, they took it out of the out of service. It was still a violation, and states were still writing the violation.
But it was just a violation and the trucker could go on down the road. A lot of.
Thankfully and successfully we petitioned CVSA and was successful.
In that to get this put back.
Into the out of service under the pretext that they can't read the road signs and they can't read the.
Electric messaging boards.
Because the reason they got throwed out in the first place was they said, well, they can still communicate with folks through you know, these translating services or their cell phone and stuff like that. Well that's the thing I helpe you read a sign or read electric TRUSTe board.
Oh that's great.
So we tell the drive public who are driving a Mini Coopers or small Sedans or that type of thing, no texting and driving. But we can tell somebody that can't speak the English language, Oh, just do the app on your phone and do the translation that way while you're driving an eighty thousand pound vehicle.
No texting and.
Driving supposed rather driving.
But I'm not saying it exactly.
So it's just, you know, it's one of those things where you would think that something in your wildest dreams. I don't think you could ever have imagined, Louis Pugh, that you would have a necessary for a law that says in order to drive on the highway you have to be able to read the signs and be proficient
in the language in order to communicate with people. You would think that that is a given, but apparently you have to spell this out and then out to fight it in a law, which is insanity in my opinion.
Well, yeah, common sense got checked at.
The door now, and you're right about that, and I'm with you, Gordon.
You wouldn't think.
We'd have to do that, This would be this hard and you wouldn't think there'd be people against it, You wouldn't think there's been people for it. Yeah, but unfortunately it's all driven again, a lot of this stuff, most of the stuff, it falls back to this whole bull crap of a driver shortage narrative. If we wouldn't be have been pushing out for the last forty years, we probably wouldn't be having a discussion on some of these
things we're having. I mean, it's pretty common sense to me that you should let a truck or use the restroom, but unfortunately places don't, so we're having to try to get a bill in Congress pass for that.
Yeah, exactly, unbelievable.
Well, Louis, our time is up here, and gosh, we gotta do this more often because there is just so much, I mean, there's so much within this to talk about. And then also, you know, some of this crazy stuff is that we're seeing, as far as this English language proficiency and the bill before Congress on that.
But again, I.
Appreciate your time, and I appreciate your patience dealing with us, and keep up the fight, my friend, because all of this stuff is so important, and I don't think people appreciate the efforts that oh Ida does, and I would encourage everybody to get behind the organization. Get go to the website, check out where you can call, because you need to be engaged.
You need to call your congressman. If you want stuff changed.
You've got to get Congress off this, get them off their butts and have them pass this legislation. And the only way they do that is that they hear from you, Louis. Thank you so much. I appreciate your time with us today.
Thank you God, thanks for having me.
Thank you all those truckers out there and go to Fighting for Truckers dot com and OIDA dot com and join. The more members we have, the more grassroots you have, the stronger we are, and the faster we can make changes exactly.
Thank you so much.
I'm Kevin Gordon, America's Trucking Network seven hundred w LW.
Busted my butt trigger treating, and when I got back it, Daddy took my stinker's. Mom took the kid cats, Grandpa took the twicks, Grandma took the recy cumps. Mela this candy corn and candy corneous sucks handles.
Take your hands off of your candy We're the ones who went Dora door to.
Get this stuff and the last thing we want is there be left one that's steaking.
Second candy hor a holiday reminder from seven hundred WL candy.
Corneious sucks run a business and not thinking about podcasting.
I was a great interview with him. I always enjoy talking to him. There's always a lot of great information when we talk. And I can't emphasize enough the importance of these bills that are before Congress. And as he mentioned, you need to check the website oh Aida working for truckers and making sure that you are calling Congress. It is extremely important that you call your congressman and senators to make sure that you show your support for these bills.
That was we talked about with Louis Representative David Ross Ross bill Non Domicile CDLs and English Language Proficiency from Senator Roger Marshall. Now, if you call the Congress Hotline or there what they call it Congressional Data Line, in order to connect with your individual senators or congressman. You call that number and it's area code to zero two
two two four three one two one. That is the US and US House and Senate house switchboard operator to zero two two two four three one two one, and all you have to do is contact them, let them know what state you're in, where you live, and they will put you in touch with the individual congressman or senator in your area and you can leave and be polite.
You want to make sure that you're leaving a notification or a voice message for your congressman or senator and letting them know that how you stand on these issues and want them to vote to pass this legislation. Also, make sure that you check out o IDAs Fighting for Truckers dot com, as Louie had mentioned. And by the way, if you miss any part of our program, if you miss any of our shows, make sure you hit up that iHeartRadio app. Of course that's brought to you buyer
friends at Rush Truck Centers, and we certainly appreciate that. Now, kind of digging a little bit deeper into this subject as far as what we were discussing with Louis because there was an editorial that was put out recently by Craig Fuller.
He is the CEO of Freight Waves.
And he kind of lays this out and kind of explains because when we hear that the FMCSA back in twenty sixteen under the Obama administration. The final days of the Aboma administration relaxed the enforcement of the English language Preference of English Language Proficiency regulation as far as pulling people over and making them out of service if they don't pass this. A lot of people have asked, well, why didn't the Trump administration when they came into office
push that back. As Louis pointed out, this was a provision that was put in there as far as non domiciled CDLs in order to get people that in a particular state to be able to obtain a license in another state or be able to be allowed to drive in other states. This was non intended to bypass the
English language proficiency. Now, even though they decreased that the number of people out on the highway I think Louis talked about was six thousand people potentially at that point isn't a big deal and so it wasn't on the radar screen that much. However, with the flood and the open gates and the invasion of this country under the Biden administration, and with some of the people being able to get driver's license, that shouldn't have been getting driver's license.
This has become even a more serious problem. So that's why back during the first Trump administration that these bills weren't pushed through. I wish that had somehow gotten on the radar screen and pushed through, but it certainly is now now. In this editorial, American trucking industry is facing unprecedented challenges, marked by a deepening economic crisis and deteriorating
highway safety standards. While supply chain disruptions during the COVID nineteen pandemic brought attention to the transportation sector, the narrative surrounding these issues has been largely mischaracterized, particularly regarding the nature and extent of the p orted truck driver shortage. He points out. In this background, American Trucking Associations has consistently promoted the idea of a chronic truck driver shortage
to Congress and the public. During the height of the COVID nineteen pandemic, when supply chains experienced a significant strain, this narrative gained considerable traction. Responding to what was portrayed as an urgent crisis, both states and federal governments implemented
policy changes aimed at rapidly expanding truck driver workforces. Now he mentions in here that the measures including lower standards and commercial driver's license qualification, relaxing training requirements, and easing restrictions. Now he's saying that these could have been done other ways than this, but it was a push to get as many people in there, and he is faulting the
American trucking associations for allowing this to happen. Regulatory changes had far reaching consequences that extended beyond simply increasing the number of available drivers. The trucking industry witnessed an influx of inadequately trained individuals, many of whom reportedly lacked proper understanding of American road regulations and language proficiency. This situation
created a dangerous precedent. Now I mentioned that a lot of these violations that come into play, as far as hours of operation and operating vehicles over more than twenty up to twenty hours per day. Freight recession has been caused by an endless glut of capacity. Now he mentions that there was a lot of things that were going on. But as he pointed out that in order to cut costs in order to bring down because the freight rates were coming down and this was starting to cut into
the profitability. They had to figure out a way or they wanted to figure out a way of lowering costs. The big costs is driver wages. So if you can get a cheaper labor force is and what we are experiencing in the economy as it is now, with the glut of cheap labor with a lot of these illegals that are here in the country that will work for less than minimum wage or at or about minimum wage, depresses and pulls down the wages for the American people.
So the people that are in the middle class and the people that would normally have those jobs, those are being dragged down. And we're basically having an economy now where we've seen more and more of where it's a squeeze squeezing out the middle class and that you're left with just lower class and upper class in your economy.
You need all three classes in order to be a successful country and in order to have an adequate workforce, because generally, if businesses are expanding, you can have the opportunity of hiring people which pull people out of the lower class lower incomes into the middle class and middle
class wages. But when you have an influx of illegals that are willing to work and being hired less than what the normal wages are, that is going to have the effect of depressing those wages and keeping the workforce down. To sacrifice profitability or make sure that your profitability is up at the expense of safety is one of the
things that Craig Fuller is talking about in here. What has followed has been described as a great freight recession, characterized as a most severe economic downturn of the freight industry has ever experienced. Yes, this freight recession has gone on now for more than three years, and normally these freight recesses, and you folks in the trucking industry, you've
seen this before. You've seen situations where the trucking recession has gone on and where you've had different times of where freight rates have been down, freight rates have been up, and you've seen how these have ebbed and flowed over the years. And generally, if they are going to last, they're only going to last for about I think the average is what I was seeing was somewhere between twelve and fourteen months. We are now into the third year
of this great recession. Also, he points out here in his editorial, and I'm going to put this on Facebook because this is extremely important.
Craig Fuller, CEO of Freight Waves.
Family owned trucking firms have been wiped out because they can't compete. ATA is under claiming that ATA is basically.
Undermining their members.
Members joined the American Trucking Associations in order to be part of a group of a group that is going to be fighting for their rights and promoting business practices that support them and help them in their industry. And what the ATA has been doing by import by allowing or pushing for or allowing these companies to push for lower wages, and some of the regulations that were not being enforced, and some of the lacks that was being done as far as the actual issuing of these CDLs
has actually hurt their membership. And he's very adamant on that. And this isn't the first time I've heard this being discussed and the first time I've heard this being talked about, and so this is definitely something that has to be looked at. Now we're not going to have obviously a
chance to get to it today. But one of the things that has been pointed out is how the actual process of illegal aliens are getting CDLs in the United States, and some of the discussions where California is claiming that they are actually in within the regulations, that they're following the regulations, their arguments quite honestly don't meet the standards. If they're claiming that they enforce the English language proficiency,
how is somebody getting a driver's license. As we saw the accident in Florida and then the accident in southern California that the driver of both of those vehicles couldn't speak English. So if they say that they're not issuing licenses to people that can't pass the English language proficiency, how did they get a license? That's a simple question. Well, folks, we're up against clock here. Stay tuned for Red Eye Radio at the.
Top the hour.
I'm Kevin Gordon, America's Truck and Network seven hundred WL