Unprecedented: Trump official sheds light on ‘mess’ under the hood of illegal trucker crisis

Derek Barrs knew cleaning up the trucking industry would be a big job when President Donald Trump gave him the task, having spent years cracking down on commercial drivers for the Florida Highway Patrol.

Yet, even Barrs was surprised when he took the reins of the federal agency that manages the trucking industry — a crucial facet of the country’s economy currently beleaguered with illegal migrant drivers who can’t speak English, shady companies skirting enforcement regulations and hundreds of trucking schools handing out licenses like candy.

“Don’t get us wrong, we’ve always had problems,” Barrs, who has been heading the Transportation Department’s (DOT) Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) since his confirmation in October, told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

“We have seen an increase in the non-domiciled CDLs [commercial driver’s licenses], and we’ve also seen an increase of what we believe are these chameleon carriers,” Barrs said. “This is more than what I thought and do not ever remember anything like this before.”

Issues surrounding the trucking industry took center stage in August when an Indian commercial driver was accused of making an illegal U-turn on a busy interstate that resulted in the deaths of three people. The non-English speaking driver was later confirmed to be in the country illegally and a subsequent investigation revealed that he barely recognized U.S. highway signs, drawing into question how he was ever able to get his hands on a CDL to begin with.

Since that Florida crash, numerous other horrific roadside accidents have occurred involving illegal migrant truck drivers, including a wreck in California that killed three, a crash in Oregon that killed two and a horrific accident in Indiana that killed four.

All of the drivers successfully obtained non-domiciled CDLs before totaling their big rigs.

‘Zero Curriculum’

After investigating the circumstances that led to the fatal crash in Florida, the DOT in September handed down severe restrictions against non-domiciled CDL holders and identified state governments that were purportedly issuing licenses to foreign truck drivers unlawfully. The DOT in February doubled down with more rules to keep illegal migrants away from big rigs, rolling out new screening processes and eliminating a loophole that previously allowed foreigners with bad driving records to obtain trucking licenses.

Labor groups closely aligned with the Democrat Party quickly sued to squash the new regulations, claiming that the rules would harm hundreds of thousands of foreign nationals.

Barrs argues that the rules are solely intended to keep American highways safe.

“No one wants to lose good, qualified drivers,” Barrs told the DCNF, speaking about the number of migrant drivers expected to be taken off the roads over the next several years due to the tighter regulations. “To me, this is the safety aspect — we have to always bring it back to that piece.”

“I am not willing, in the role I have at FMCSA, to compromise safety just to put someone in the seat of a truck,” he continued.

The Trump administration has also heavily targeted truck driving schools allegedly doling out commercial licenses without any real training, otherwise known as “CDL mills.” In February, the DOT announced more than 550 commercial driving schools that train truckers and bus drivers would be closing down after investigations found they employed unqualified instructors and failed to appropriately test students.

“We have been in driver training schools that we have shut down where there was actually zero curriculum at all,” Barrs revealed to the DCNF.

Another major area of concern for Barr’s FMCSA has been the prevalence of so-called chameleon carriers, trucking companies that maliciously rotate through Department of Transportation (DOT) registration numbers, names or ownership structure in order to avoid enforcement actions.

Barrs noted that his agency can find one single address tied to up to well over 50 companies, exemplifying how deep these network of chameleon carries can be.

“We believe that they’re tied a lot together, meaning these companies have common addresses. “There is a real-life example of like 100 or so, all at the address in the middle of an interstate,” Barrs said. “That’s not acceptable.”

“And the reason why that’s not acceptable is, how in the world can you run a business from the interstate?” he added.

The presence or chameleon carriers in high-profile trucking incidents have sparked politicians at the very top of Washington, D.C., to take action.

Indiana GOP Sen. Jim Banks, whose constituents have been killed by unlawfully present truck drivers, urged the DOT in February to more fervently tackle the issue of chameleon carriers. Similarly, Wyoming GOP Rep. Harriet Hageman introduced a bill to eliminate their presence in the trucking industry, legislation that earned the endorsement of the most powerful Teamsters Union in the country.

Trump highlighted the trucking industry crisis onto the national stage when he introduced “Dalilah’s Law” during his latest State of the Union address.

“Many, if not most, illegal aliens do not speak English and cannot read even the most basic road signs as to direction, speed, danger or location,” Trump stated during the address. “That’s why tonight I’m calling on Congress to pass what we will call the Dalilah law — barring any state from granting commercial driver’s licenses to illegal aliens.”

The bill is named after Dalilah Coleman, a young California girl severely injured after getting hit by an 18-wheeler in June 2024. The driver of that big rig was an illegal migrant and the company involved was allegedly a chameleon carrier.

“I can tell you that, under Secretary Sean Duffy’s leadership and the direction that I have and the job that I and our team at FMCSA are charged with, my expectation is for us to clean up the mess that we have and try to make it as safe as possible,” Barrs said.

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