MAGA fans are rejoicing on social media in favor of President Donald Trump’s plan to sign an executive order requiring commercial truck drivers to speak English.
Breitbart News reported that Trump would sign the order Monday evening because “President Trump believes that English is a non-negotiable safety requirement for professional drivers.” Last month, Trump designated English as “the official language of the United States.”
“This is such a big deal! So grateful for this, the roads will be much safer. Like many, I have seen many accidents or near accidents from unqualified drivers,” posted @coffeegirlvegas.
Like many, I have seen many accidents or near accidents from unqualified drivers
Can anyone explain how knowing English would reduce traffic accidents? Is it because of detour signs?
In the US, traffic signs with crucial information are often written in only English text, no symbols, pictograms or anything else that could make it possible to guess what the sign is saying without being able to read English.
Can you please elaborate with some examples if possible? I’m trying to picture this from highways and roadways here in Florida, but I am struggling to get your gist. I will look again on the way home tonight. However I am not a trucker or cdl so I might be oblivious to some.
*sniff sniff*
Smells like your food is about to cost even more.
Not sure about other states, but in mine, the ability to read and understand English is a requirement for getting a license…
Now you could make an argument that’s not the same as speaking English, and my rebuttal is “should we ban mute, or speech-impared people from getting a CDL”?
I’m not really clear how they would even enforce this. They don’t have a database or standard test for speaking english.
FBI: “Do you speak english?”
Driver: “Sí señor. Aber ich lerne auch Deutsch.”
FBI: “Fatastich. Guten Abend.”
, and my rebuttal is “should we ban mute, or speech-impared people from getting a CDL”?
Well those people are already Undesirables under the rule of el trumpo, so their answer is… yeah?
This is an unpresidented act
Trump can’t even speak English.
Which will be ignored like the rest of his Executive Orders that don’t actually have anything to do with the Executive.
Is there any such requirement for ships in international waters?
English seems a bit too narrow, but I could see one of maybe 10 languages being a requirement (English, Spanish, French, German, Arabic, Mandarin, Russian, Portuguese, etc)
Or perhaps, like the UN requires, at least three on this list.
As always another trump “policy” that’ll backfire spectacularly
If it were enforced, yes. But let’s be real.
Probably won’t matter much. No ships means nothing to haul
Who the fuck is supposed to drive the trucks then? I live in (upstate) New York and it seems like even up there a significant population of Mexican truck drivers.
Here, if they don’t speak English, they are almost all Eastern European or Indian. Lots of Russian, Belarusian, Chechen, etc
How does being Mexican mean you don’t speak English? Have you never met a bilingual person in your life?
If you ever followed American politics throughout history, you can see how this can easily be abused. Before, you had to take a test to determine if you were smart enough to vote. The test was the same for both whites and minorities, but it was graded differently depending on your race.
What defines “speaking English”?. Is it a basic level, being able to read road signs or being able to speak to dispatch, the loading crew, or ems at a fundamental level? Or is it college level? Will you even be tested if you’re white?
With trumps many many anti-minority policies and rhetoric, and his abuse of ice, as well as setting up black sites and selling people to the El Salvadoran concentration camp, it’s hard not to think that this will be abused in some way. This is in no way a pro-English law. This is an anti-minority law.
However, cause of how dot and cdls are set up now, I doubt that much will come out of it tbh
Good thing we won’t need so many of those when supply chains dry up from tariffs!
Breitbart News reported that
“News”
So…. Let’s get this straight… he is signing orders to make things happen that have been happening for almost a century now??
What’s next, an executive order to make air breathable??
Oh definitely not - he has been attacking the Clean Air act.
I’m assuming it’s just a way to sneak literacy tests into something. You can speak english, but can you speak it well enough to pass a subjective test administered by someone who hates you for being hispanic?
Classic authoritarian tactics:
Target a marginalized group with an issue that you’ve framed as ridiculous or politically suicidal to disagree with, get public opinion riled up by manipulating their grievances through exploiting their internal prejudices, and make everything an extension of preserving national security. Once you’ve manipulated enough people into giving you extralegal power, simply expand the circle of ‘national security threats’.
In just a few months we’ve watched Trump:
steal the power of the purse and the power to enact tariffs from Congress,
create a precedent for the unconstitutional arrest, detainment, and removal of legal residents and dissenting citizens,
iterate his intentions to restart American expansionism into Canada and Greenland,
Successfully twist the arm of media companies, law firms, and universities into doing his bidding,
And his other executive order directs Dept. Of Homeland Security, DoJ, and DoD to create a plan for implementation of military and national security assets to “prevent crime and protect public safety”.
Welcome to the ‘find out’ stage.
Not in Trump’s America. Making breathability a requirement could limit some broligarch’s freedom to do business.
I have a CDL, Class A with X endorsement.
This changes nothing. CDL manuals, exams, and paperwork are all in English. What I think Trump thinks he’s doing is banning Mexicans from driving trucks in the US, but this is controlled by a reciprocity agreement between the US and Mexico. Surprise, Mexicans don’t have to take American exams for a CDL when they can have a license issued by the Mexican government.
Basically all this is is white supremacist virtue signaling.
Nah you’re still thinking about it within the the UN/long peace legal framework. They can just do a decree that says no mexicans, and their extrajudidical thugs will take the signal to harass and murder truck drivers.
B-but that’s illegal ☝️🤓
Are you going to stop them?
Are you going to stop them?
Truck drivers aren’t the most progressive, but if they see fellow drivers getting harassed/attacked by four wheelers you can bet your ass they’re gonna go Mad Max on their asses for that
I would love to see the US go a month without Mexican truck drivers. The UK pulled the same stunt with Polish truck drivers. People were rejoicing at empty shelves and overflowing garbage bins.
And enforcement was relaxed under Obama
I read comments like this and all I can feel is astonishment that anyone’s life is so empty that they can dedicate time to caring about this.
Like, it sounds made up, but honestly whether true or not… like, who cares? It’s so trivial and life has so much to offer. This comment is the first and last time I’ll ever think about this.
Well, it’s fact. Some truckers and trucker’s groups have theorized that the increase in CDL involved accidents since the relaxing of this rule are caused instead of simply correlated.
I actually agree with enforcing rules like this so even though trump’s an asshole, this one might improve safety.
“Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.”
- Benjamin Franklin
I think it would be great if you can list some credible source before asserting a fact.
Also I have a question, why do truck drivers speaking English makes the road more safe? As long as they understand the required knowledge, I don’t see the language they speak matters in terms of safety, but that could just be my lack of understanding in this area.
It’s in the news?
Quickest example I can come up with:
“Winter conditions ahead, reduce speed now.”
You know what also happened in 2016? They revised the definition of “large truck” to include 329 more vehicles. By increasing the sample size you’re going to see more accidents. Common cause of accidents is fatigue from drivers working too many hours. That gets better if there’s less drivers and they have to know English though right?
The article states: “Republican Representative Harriet Hageman of Wyoming … [states] a consistent rise in fatal truck crashes since its implementation.”
Whereas your statement is “[Requiring truck driver to speak English improves safety] is a fact”.
I am not saying what you said is necessarily wrong or the policy is necessarily harmful; but I feel we probably need more proof than “a republican representative said so”, to assert a certain statement as “fact”.
BTW, neither you nor the news article provided the relevant data, which IMHO doesn’t really inspire confidence in your argument. Let alone all the potiential confounding variable others have mentioned.
Doesn’t the US have a shitton of unstandardized road signs which are just words?
I feel like you have to have some English proficiency to understand them.
If all those signs were in Chinese, it would take a commercial truck driver about a week to memorize the writing for each and learn what it means.
You don’t need to speak the language for that.But the inconsistency is the problem.
Take a look at the top signs about driving on the shoulder. Who is to say there aren’t twenty more variations?
Maybe a couple of
“Driving on shoulder mandatory”
“Trucks on shoulder only”
“Passing on shoulder permitted”
“$100 fine for driving on shoulder”
“Keep shoulder clear”
“No trucks allowed on shoulder”
There doesn’t seem to be any standard. It’s just text.
and if they were in Spanish, you may not even need a whole day.
Executive orders are not laws. He can direct how the law in enforced, but he can’t just unilaterally define new laws
I keep seeing comments from people pretending that the way it is meant to be is the way it is. Trump has said the law is what he says. There is no effective defense against him declaring laws if there is no enforcement. He has defied judges orders and will continue to do so. The EOs are laws because they are being followed and nobody is stopping them.
Saying he can’t do that comes across like a right wing talking point. Trying to convince people that he can’t do what he is clearly doing, so those who are opposed will just sit around thinking the natural order will take care of it.
And it’s working. Sure there have been some protests. But no where the amount needed to make a change. Trump is now a dictator, and far too many Americans are ok with it, directly and passively.
Many laws are written to give the executive branch leeway in defining the details of how a law is to be implemented. This makes sense, assuming everyone is acting in good faith; technologies, science, standards, and best practices all evolve over time.
Laws are usually written in a way to ensure Congressional oversight, to prevent the executive either intentionally or accidentally from subverting their will. But with a treasonous President and a complicit Congress, here we are… ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
