English Proficiency Enforcement 2025: Crackdown or Cover for Discrimination in Trucking?

Nov 3

English Proficiency Enforcement 2025: Crackdown or Cover for Discrimination in Trucking?

Since July, the landscape for truck drivers has shifted yet again. The wave of English proficiency enforcement that began as a push for road safety has turned into something far more dramatic especially in Texas, where the shift from patchwork oversight to zero tolerance is upending the industry.

From Policy to Practice: When Old Rules Hit Hard

For years, federal law required commercial drivers to communicate in English, but enforcement was lax. In Texas, drivers could operate intrastate and cross-border under USMCA with little risk of language checks. All of that changed in 2025, as state and federal authorities, invoking new executive orders, now enforce this decades-old rule with unprecedented rigor.

Texas’s zero-tolerance approach means every driver, domestic, USMCA cross-border, or otherwise faces rigorous scrutiny. State police have pulled over 7,000 drivers nationwide for English deficiencies since summer, sidelining more than 400 in Texas in just a few months. Skills tests and roadside stops now start with language checks, and carriers feel the crunch of lost staff and rising rates.

A New, Troubling Trend: Minority Drivers in the Crosshairs

But the numbers only tell part of the story. What’s harder to tally but impossible to miss on Texas highways and border routes is an alarming uptick in the racial profiling and harassment of minority drivers, especially Hispanic truckers.

Hispanic and foreign-born drivers report being stopped, interrogated, and sometimes detained at a far higher rate than their lighter-skinned or white U.S.-born colleagues regardless of their actual English proficiency.
Advocacy organizations and news outlets are documenting roadside language checks escalating into document drills, immigration screenings, and arrests often spearheaded by state police working closely with ICE.
Drivers with strong accents or limited English are reporting longer, more invasive stops, and a growing sense of being targeted simply for how they look or sound.
Many drivers fear that the mandate is becoming less a tool for safety and more an excuse for checks on citizenship or immigration status the line between traffic enforcement and anti-immigrant policing is blurring in real time.

“English Only” or Something More? The Civil Rights Question

Supporters say strict language enforcement boosts safety and unity on the road, but critics and civil rights advocates see a more complicated and troubling picture emerging:

State police partnerships with federal immigration authorities in Texas have introduced a new level of fear and suspicion among minority truckers.
There are growing reports of drivers held or threatened with deportation after being questioned about English skills, even on minor infractions.
The result is an industry where, for some, “English proficiency” feels less about public safety and more about exclusion an unintended cover for discriminating against the Hispanic workforce that is the backbone of America’s trucking engine.

Industry Fallout: Shrinking Workforce, Rising Tension, Divided Reactions

Strict enforcement is hitting carriers and drivers hard in every direction:

Driver shortages are accelerating as minority drivers exit the profession or avoid certain routes and regions.
Carriers are scrambling to adapt: some double down on English training, others pause operations, and still more worry about safety scores and insurance costs from unexpected out-of-service orders.
Most importantly, the mood across the driver community is shifting from resignation and adaptation to frustration and fear.

Looking Ahead: Safety Must Not Mean Segregation

When I wrote about the English proficiency mandate in July, the focus was on safety, clarity, and compliance. Now, just a few months later, it’s impossible to ignore the darker edge: the risk that, in the name of safety, we are enabling discrimination, racial profiling, and deepening industry divides.

Texas and the nation’s highways should not become zones of suspicion or injustice. The conversation must move beyond strict enforcement to demand real fairness, transparency, and respect for the drivers of every background who keep freight and the economy moving.

Sources/Further Reading:

Marcos Hidalgo

English Proficiency Enforcement 2025: Crackdown or Cover for Discrimination in Trucking?