Sean Duffy, U.S. Transportation Secretary, is convinced that English language proficiency (ELP) for commercial vehicle drivers is a matter of safety.
“Americans are a lot safer on roads alongside truckers who can understand and interpret our traffic signs,” he said at a May 20 event announcing tougher enforcement of a regulation that has long been on the books.
This has become painfully obvious in recent days. A fatal accident in Florida, caused by a non-English-speaking truck driver, has created a flurry of headlines on both industry and mainstream media. The U.S. Department of Transportation has launched an investigation, and the driver has been extradited from California back to Florida to face charges of vehicular homicide as well as immigration violations. In the meantime, U.S. Secretary of State Mark Rubio has announced an immediate pause on work visas for commercial truck drivers.
ENGLISH PROFICIENCY IS NOT A NEW REQUIREMENT
Established back in 1936 by the Interstate Commerce Commission, Section 391.11(b)(2) of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations (FMCSR) requires drivers operating commercial motor vehicles in interstate commerce to “read and speak the English language sufficiently to converse with the general public, to understand highway traffic signs and signals in the English language, to respond to official inquiries, and to make entries on required reports and records.”
However, whether the ELP requirement should be enforced at roadside inspections or by individual motor carriers has long been a subject of debate.
These words appeared in President Bill Clinton’s Executive Order 13166, issued August 11, 2000: “Each Federal agency shall examine the services it provides and develop and implement a system by which LEP (Limited English Proficiency) persons can meaningfully access those services consistent with, and without unduly burdening, the fundamental mission of the agency.”
ELP ENFORCEMENT SEE-SAW
So began the see-saw battle of whether to enforce or not enforce the ELP requirement.
Up until 2015, the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance (CVSA) required drivers who could not meet ELP standards to be placed out of service. That policy changed on April 1, 2015, when CVSA removed the language requirement from its out-of-service criteria.
In June 2015, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMSCA) issued a policy memorandum that clarified the policy: Driver interviews to confirm ELP were NOT to be conducted. An inability to read and write English was acceptable, as long as the driver could communicate sufficiently with the inspector, even if an interpreter, phone application, cue cards or other aids were necessary.
The policy changed again with Executive Order 14286, issued on April 28, 2025, by President Donald Trump. Just a few days later, on May 1, the CVSA issued revised guidance recommending a return to its original out-of-service order regarding ELP.
On May 20, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy announced new guidelines for enforcement, calling for drivers who fail the ELP portion of roadside testing to be placed out of service. That same day, a policy memorandum directed the FMCSA to change its enforcement policy and require roadside inspections to be conducted in English. The memo prohibited the use of interpreters or other aids and reinstituted testing to determine the driver’s English proficiency.
Then, on June 18, 2025, the Commercial Motor Vehicle English Proficiency Act (S. 2114) was introduced into the U.S. Senate by Senator Roger Marshall (R-Kansas). The bill requires prospective drivers to demonstrate ELP before passing the CDL knowledge test or receiving a certification of fitness. The bill was referred to the Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation. If enacted into law, states will have two years to incorporate the rule into their CDL testing process.
IMPACT ON CARRIERS
Carriers, as always, are left to adapt to the changes. Those that hire new drivers from CDL schools who offer training in other languages and those who sponsor foreign drivers for H2B visas to work in the U.S. will need to examine their processes to make sure current and future drivers can meet the English proficiency rules.
“We can’t advocate noncompliance,” said David Heller, senior vice president of safety and government affairs for the Truckload Carriers Association. “The English language proficiency standard has been in place for the longest time. Our membership prides itself in being compliant with existing rules and regulations.”
Compliance, however, may be more difficult to achieve when the goalposts keep moving.
A few months ago, a driver who is deficient in English might have gotten by with a bilingual inspector or a translation app on a smartphone. The penalty for failure was simply a citation.
Since enforcement of the ELP requirement began in late June, the situation is more complicated. Once the driver is placed out of service, the carrier may have to retrieve a truck, which is likely loaded with a customer’s freight.
Carriers must also decide if ELP testing of current drivers is warranted, update company policies and institute pre-employment screening. Hiring numbers could decline if carriers determine that applicants are at risk of running afoul of the regulations. Visa sponsorships could be ended, or at least restricted to workers from countries where English is the primary language.
“What’s on my mind is the effect on driver capacity,” Heller explained. “How many drivers are we actually talking about here?
Heller is careful not to combine the requirement for proficiency in English with the immigration issue in general.
“The H2B visa is a legal document that allows you to work in this country,” he explained. The ELP rule is not against that; it’s against those that don’t have the ability to converse in English.”
ENFORCEMENT QUESTIONS
One issue is that the services available to foreign drivers, such as assistance in finding a sponsor carrier and CDL schools that offer training in languages other than English, may view their clients’ ELP differently than a law enforcement officer conducting a roadside inspection.
“There are some states that have even offered the CDL exam in a different language,” Heller said. “This is where the regulation and the enforcement of the regulation come through.”
The FMCSA’s guidance memorandum of May 20 mandates a two-step assessment to be administered during a roadside inspection:
1. Driver interview
In English and without assistance, the driver must be able to answer basic questions about their trip, cargo, vehicle, paperwork and so on. Inspectors may also ask about information recorded in the driver’s record-of-duty status or about information contained in shipping papers, including hazardous materials.
If the inspector is satisfied that the driver can adequately converse in English, the inspection will proceed to the second step. If the driver fails step one of the process, the second step will not be conducted.
2. Highway traffic sign assessment
Information about road signs will be taken from the Federal Highway Administration’s Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices, which can be downloaded here. Messages on trailer-mounted changeable message boards, such as construction warnings, can be part of the questioning, too.
Trucking industry vendors, including Trucksafe and CarriersEdge, are offering products to assist carriers in assessing their current drivers as well as developing process for onboarding new ones.
Ensuring that the drivers they hire or lease are qualified and safe is a process that carriers are accustomed to. Most have processes in place to document testing and training, both as evidence of compliance and as a defensive strategy in case of future litigation. Adding a process to test for ELP and document results won’t be a major hurdle for most carriers — but it needs to be accomplished before a customer’s freight is stranded due to the driver being placed out of service.
This story originally appeared in the September/October 2025 edition of Truckload Authority, the official publication of the Truckload Carriers Association.
Cliff Abbott is an experienced commercial vehicle driver and owner-operator who still holds a CDL in his home state of Alabama. In nearly 40 years in trucking, he’s been an instructor and trainer and has managed safety and recruiting operations for several carriers. Having never lost his love of the road, Cliff has written a book and hundreds of songs and has been writing for The Trucker for more than a decade.
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