President Donald Trump's executive order boosting enforcement of English language proficiency for all commercial vehicle drivers in the country has some potential to impact rates -- if it puts thousands of working CDL drivers out-of-service (OOS). But truth is, no one truly has a handle on just how many drivers don't speak English well enough to satisfy the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration's recently revised guidance for inspectors on ELP enforcement at roadside.
Overdrive's recent survey asked the readership to estimate, based on their direct experiences over-the-road, just what percentage of the trucking workforce today doesn't speak the language. Though most survey responses occurred prior to newly revised FMCSA roadside guidance, if respondents' estimates are anywhere near correct, a huge chunk of working CDL drivers might be OOS.
Survey respondents' most common answer, with 40% of the vote, was also the highest possible choice -- "more than 25%." Readers were asked to estimate the percent of "drivers you’ve directly encountered" who "don’t communicate in or comprehend English well enough to satisfy current language-proficiency regulations."
On a recent trip to the scales in Connecticut for Roadcheck, it was easy to find a driver who didn't possess full ELP. In August of 2023, the FMCSA's Women in Trucking Advisory Board put out a report estimating 3.8% of drivers demonstrated limited ELP, but several respondents to the Overdrive survey felt that number is certainly higher or has shot up over the last few years. Here's where survey respondents put their own estimates, along the way also sharing stories of cross-cultural encounters on the road.
"Every single day on the road you run into someone that can't speak a word of English," wrote one small fleet owner. "Every single day." The owner described drivers watching his flatbed work wanting to learn more but too unskilled in the language to ask. At once, interestingly, some of those non-English speakers seemed helpful.
"A few weeks ago we hauled a stack of chassis for the first time. There was a driver next to us, while we were hooking up to the chassis, that couldn't speak a single word of English, but was actually very helpful showing us a few tricks in how to properly secure the chassis stack," the small fleet owner wrote.
However, as with any group, there's good and bad. "Thursday I was securing a load of lumber and a driver came up behind me and just started watching me do it. I asked him if he was all good, and he just responded in whatever non-English he had, letting me know he was new to flatbed and had no idea what he was doing. No English, no flatbed experience, no way to communicate with others around him to gain some knowledge," the fleet owner concluded.
Others hear the lack of ELP enforcement everywhere. "Foreign spoken languages are all you hear in the truck stops," wrote one commenter. "They really need to put a stop to the foreign trucking companies/brokers operating out of country, most of which are based in Illinois. They rip drivers off, haul cheap freight and dispatch from countries around the world. As a small trucking company, I receive calls from them daily and it’s annoying."
Feeling like an influx of non-English speaking drivers was hurting business came across as a common theme. In South Florida, known for its bad outbound rates, one commenter estimated 95% of drivers there didn't speak English.
An Overdrive review of non-domiciled CDLs, often issued to foreign citizens, found that as of early April, 40% of the CDLs issued in the state of Illinois so far this year were non-domiciled CDLs. Many commenters flagged Illinois and California as having lots of foreign drivers (California doesn't even keep counts of the non-domiciled CDLs it issues to foreign citizens).
"Printing drivers just like printing money," wrote one 22-year veteran owner-operator, likening the influx of non-ELP drivers to price inflation.
[Related: Trump admin reviewing non-domiciled CDLs for foreign drivers: How many are there?]
"Over the last five years I have seen a serious uprising in foreign drivers, and most of them that I have come across are unable to perform simple tasks, such as sliding tandems," wrote one commenter who pegged the non-ELP crowd at a full 60%. "I know this because I've tried to communicate with them myself."
One commenter associated a lack of English with a lack of driving skills, pointing the finger at faulty CDL schools and cut-rate trucking operations. "The driving from the non-English speakers leaves one wondering what cereal box they pulled their CDL out of," the commenter wrote.
[Related: Booming interest in English classes in the nation's ELP violation capital]
Some commenters flagged not only the safety concerns but operational delays and headaches from so much translation going on. "I entered 15%-25% as a guesstimate of drivers I've directly encountered who aren't ELP," one commenter wrote, yet went on to guess that 75% of warehouses he visits don't have native-English-speaking staff, which complicates things. "That wasn't very common 'back in my day,' which started 32 years ago," the trucker concluded.
Just 18% of respondents pegged the number of non-ELP drivers at "5% or fewer," in line with the FMCSA advisory board's 2023 estimate.
A scant 6% said they'd never met a driver who couldn't speak English.
Read responses to, results from all the survey questions:
Question 1: Is ELP enforcement truly necessary?
Question 2: What percentage of drivers don't speak English?
Question 3: Do truckers want ELP to be an OOS violation?
Question 4: Non-domiciled CDLs: Should states allow them to go to non-citizens?
