Delilah's Law: A 2019 Loophole Put Illegal Aliens in 80,000-Pound Trucks | Shannon Everett

[00:00:00] Illegal Immigration, CDLs, and Lawlessness. It's been a theme of not only the past election, but of the future of our country. I'm Robert McNeely in for Jenny Beth Martin. This is The Jenny Beth Show.

[00:00:30] Welcome to The Jenny Beth Show. Delilah's Law is a proposed U.S. federal law aimed at tightening the rules for who can obtain a commercial driver's license, otherwise known as a CDL, to drive large trucks and other commercial vehicles. It is named after Delilah Coleman, a young girl who suffered life-altering injuries in a 2024 crash involving a semi-truck in the Golden State of California.

[00:00:58] Now what would Delilah's Law do ultimately for those seeking safety on the open road? The proposal seeks to strengthen trucking safety rules through several measures. One, restrict CDL eligibility. Limit which non-citizens can qualify for certain commercial driver's licenses, particularly people without qualifying immigration status.

[00:01:24] Also, require English proficiency by strengthening requirements for truck drivers to understand English, including reading road signs and communicating with law enforcement. Verifying eligibility, also a third tenant. Tightening the checks of applicants' identity, their immigration status, and their qualifications to drive on the road.

[00:01:46] Strengthening enforcement and law enforcement by making it harder for drivers who fail to meet federal requirements to obtain or retain commercial driver privileges. But as of this recording, October 29th of 2026, Delilah's Law has not passed Congress. The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee approved H.R. 5688. That's H.R. 5688.

[00:02:13] That House resolution on March 18th of 2026. But the bill still needs a vote by the full House of Representatives and further congressional approval before it can become federal law. Now, why is this controversial in the first place? Supporters say it will improve highway safety by ensuring truck drivers are properly licensed, trained, and also able to communicate in English. That's written and spoken.

[00:02:41] Critics raise concerns about its immigration restrictions and the potential loss of jobs for immigrant truck drivers, possibly affecting the trucking capacity and consumer prices. This all according to ABC7 in Los Angeles, California. But the bottom line is this. Delilah's Law is a proposed trucking safety and commercial licensing standard, a measure not in an acted federal law.

[00:03:08] So some separate federal trucking regulations are already in effect. So the proposal should not be confused with the rules currently governing commercial drivers. Joining us to deal with all of these crucial issues and what is on the books, what's not on the books, and who should ultimately be held responsible for what has turned into violent crimes across America's interstate highway system.

[00:03:34] Welcome, Shannon Everett of Americans United Truckers to detail everything for us today. Welcome to the show, Shannon. And Robert, I'm delighted to be here with you today to talk about these issues impacting the entire nation. And as you are sitting here, we are very proud to have you on as well to really highlight what I think is very simple. If you break a law, you've broken that law.

[00:04:03] I don't know why it's so controversial, but we'll dive into what's happening not only with illegal immigration, but specifically Delilah's Law. Is there anything in my monologue that was off point? Because you're the subject matter expert at this. What is the problem designed to solve by introducing legislation like this? And what have trucking regulations failed to address in the United States?

[00:04:27] I think most of the listeners would be, you know, surprised even still today to understand that, you know, this phenomenon that we've got with these improperly credentialed drivers is a new phenomenon. This is not an existing loophole that goes back for decades. You'll hear people sometimes defend it, saying, oh, these drivers have always been here. We've always had these problems. But that's not accurate.

[00:04:53] There was a loophole that was opened in 2019 that wasn't expanded until around 2021. So really the situation that we're in with all of these dangerous drivers being improperly licensed, not qualified, not trained, started around 2021 and really exploded between 21 and before it was discovered. We discovered that we discovered the crisis in the fall of 24.

[00:05:20] And so it ran for about three or four years there before it was really uncovered. And and so Delilah's law is is really just is putting language around this new this new crisis that we have. What evidence demonstrates that the proposed licensing restrictions would reduce crashes and perhaps save lives?

[00:05:45] So Delilah's law is is really codifying what the secretary of transportation has already issued into a federal ruling. That ruling goes to what you were describing in your monologue where you were talking about the existing qualification standards to get a license, which work visas you're supposed to have in order to be able to apply for a license.

[00:06:04] And so his ruling directly targeted those things, that 2019 guidance that I was talking about earlier was when the FMCSA said they changed the guidance to say that drivers with EAD cards could now apply for a commercial driver's license. Well, an EAD card is just an employment authorization document that is given out to anybody that goes in, applies for asylum.

[00:06:30] And then while they're waiting for their parole hearing or their, you know, whatever that hearing is called, where they go before the judge for the immigration status, they're issued these EAD cards to go to work. So typically those were reserved for, you know, lawn care care or roofing or not licensed credential requirement jobs or really safety, safety hazardous jobs. And so that was that was a new thing in 2019.

[00:06:57] And so Duffy's ruling was targeted at closing that loophole to say that you have to have these proper valid work visas. And he's he identified exactly which ones, but he did not. He did not revoke the licenses that were issued in that window of three to four years. And so even though he closed down the ability to go get new licenses, he did not require them to be recertified or to be revoked. Delilah's law changed that.

[00:07:24] So the additional measure that came from Delilah's law was was saying, OK, let's codify everything Secretary Duffy has done. Let's codify that into law. But let's also now require all of these drivers to go through a recertification process under Duffy's new standard. So if you got a license during that window, we want you to come back and we want you to follow his new standard within a year. It was a 12 month guideline within a year. You can come back, recertify under the new standard and keep your non domiciled CDL.

[00:07:54] And that's really that's really kind of been the hold up. It seems like industry was OK with saying, OK, we won't accept any more of these dangerous drivers. But they did not want to take away the credentials of all of the ones that had already been issued. And so and so the even though we were able to get it out of committee, it's really stalled, I believe, because of this recertification and revocation in that, you know,

[00:08:20] all these drivers that got these licenses don't deserve to stay on our highways if we know they weren't properly trained and qualified. And now I want to get to that point, Shannon, how significant of a role do driver qualifications play in these crashes? Because these licensing standards really seems to be a problem with the prior administration on a much grander scale. But I remember a story dating back to the late 1990s and the license for bribe scandal that plagued Illinois at the time in the Prairie State,

[00:08:50] because it was such a foreign story roughly 28, 30 years ago. So you had a pastor's family literally obliterated on the road. It was a horrible, fiery crash, a terrible story. And this pastor losing his wife and children, seven children. And that really plagued the former governor of Illinois, George Ryan, when he was the secretary of state. I bring that up because we've seen stories like this really ramp up in the last several years since you mentioned since 2019 on a grand scale.

[00:09:20] Is English proficiency playing a role in preventing these crashes under the new Duffy standard? Yeah, absolutely. English proficiency has been a big part of the risk of not having these drivers properly qualified. We've seen that in several of these of these large profile crashes. But there's also a couple of other things. So not only did they change the guidance so that you could now apply with this EAD card, but they also started allowing CDL schools to self-certify.

[00:09:48] They started allowing e-log manufacturers. So in 2016, the trucking industry got a new mandate that required everyone to have electronic logs in their trucks. And so we support that. Of course, you know, it helps. It makes our job easier to kind of make sure that our drivers are in compliance and using this new technology instead of doing that by paper. But at the same time, you know, they allowed the manufacturers of the e-log devices to self-certify. So we've got self-certified CDL schools.

[00:10:16] We've got self-certified e-log devices. And now we've got this flood of illegal immigration into the industry. And so it's complete lawlessness. And I think even the Secretary of Transportation has described it as the Wild West of trucking. And that's because these drivers that came in during this open border situation, they went through a CDL school that was self-certified that nobody was overseeing. So we believe they just paid for the license, received little to no training at all.

[00:10:44] And then they went in and now they're being monitored by a device that's self-certified by a manufacturer in Serbia or in India or in China. And so there's no oversight of this unqualified driver that you now put in the truck. And so the reason it's so dangerous is not only were they not trained, nobody's really overseeing their activity day to day. And so most of the crashes that you're seeing are these big blow-up crashes, high-speed rearing collisions. And that's because these guys are physically exhausted.

[00:11:12] These guys are working as indentured servants in this industry with little to no oversight. And they're working 20 hours a day. And so they're literally falling asleep at the wheel. They're driving an 80,000-pound truck. And they're pulling into stalled traffic or these situations where families are sitting there unbeknownst to them that a missile's coming from behind.

[00:11:36] And break that down for us as well, not to get into the weeds, but it's really the brokers, the companies, the actual drivers themselves. It's my understanding that a lot of these are required cash transactions. So it's harder to trace what's taking place with these exhausted drivers, with those who may be of a legal status and do not know the language. But doing the research for this piece, I'm just amazed that these middlemen seem to have no enforcement or accountability.

[00:12:05] And we'll just hand this off to whoever these CDL schools are claiming to be people that can put individuals on the road and have trained them. But that may not be the case. Well, Delilah's crash is a perfect example of that. Delilah's crash involved a freight broker.

[00:12:22] And so in previous times, these freight brokers weren't held responsible because of their interpretation of a law they call F4A that said that the middleman was not responsible for the selection of the carrier in the crash. The Supreme Court had a unanimous decision this May that changed that interpretation, said, no, in fact, freight brokers can now be held responsible for the negligent selection of these motor carriers involved in these crashes.

[00:12:52] And so during this same window, we had a phenomenon here where there was a group of middlemen that were able to say, OK, I'm going to use this driver that's not qualified. I'm going to use this driver that has no oversight and that's working 20 hours a day. And if he has a crash, I can go plead to the court that I'm a freight broker, so I'm not responsible for this crash. And they've been getting off the hook. They were let off of the hook.

[00:13:16] They were not being forced to pay for the damages in these crashes until May of this year when the Supreme Court stood up and said, hey, this is I mean, how often does the Supreme Court give us a unanimous decision? They unanimously agreed with our amicus brief to them that said, hey, these freight brokers need to be held responsible because we want to curb this this behavior. We're going to have to have some accountability here. The only reason that all of these unqualified drivers were able to come into the system is because someone was willing to load them.

[00:13:45] You're not going to find a great generational American owned trucking company who's been around for 40 or 50 years that has built up a balance sheet of, you know, successful, safe operations in our industry to be willing to allow a bunch of illegal aliens that aren't qualified to come drive for them. That doesn't happen. And so, you know, that's represented in our membership. They don't they don't do that. And so these people had to have someone they would they could work for.

[00:14:11] And the only the only companies and the only people that were willing to employ them, of course, were the ones that had no accountability. They thought they had immunity. And so this ecosystem exists as capacity for freight brokers. It does not exist in our great American owned legacy family owned trucking companies.

[00:14:31] And so we've really kind of got this war inside of the trucking industry where the corporations that have greatly benefited off of this over the last four or five years are still trying to protect this capacity. And so, you know, in in Delilah's law, for example, the only opposition that we're really seeing out there are from the benefactors of the cheaper labor. You know, well, that cheaper labor, it's not really cheap. It's actually costing in lives instead of dollars.

[00:14:59] And so it's more expensive to use these drivers when you're not qualifying them and you're not training them and you're not following the process. Of course, it's going to be cheaper if you've got all of these generational American owned trucking companies that have to follow all these regulations and all these laws and do things the right way, which we want to do because we have a duty to operate safely next to our neighbors and in our communities. But then to have this completely other standard over here where they don't have any oversight, no compliance whatsoever.

[00:15:28] And of course, those guys are going to be cheaper. But we have to we have to step back and ask ourselves, you know, why would why as a country would we want that? Why would we want anybody to be able to participate in that and to profit off of that and to destroy a great industry? Because that's what's happened. You know, if we hadn't had Secretary Duffy and this administration really step in and say, you know, kind of draw a line last September was when he really stepped up and said, hey, this is enough.

[00:15:57] It started with President Trump's executive order in April where he got wind of this controversy. And so he issued an executive order that required all these drivers to have English proficiency. But he also said, hey, I want an investigation into these non domiciled CDLs. What's going on here? Well, Duffy conducted that over, you know, a period of three or four months. And then he come out and said, the claims are absolutely true. This is this is the Wild West of trucking.

[00:16:20] And so we are so grateful because that at that moment was probably the deepest throes of a freight recession that the trucking industry has ever had. We were just overwhelmed with so much supply of this illegal capacity that it was destroying our American trucking companies. And a lot a lot of the companies probably only had with six to 12 months worth of cash flows to survive the storm that they ran.

[00:16:47] So by the time Duffy and Trump got involved, we started to see a turnaround by the first of the year. And so now most of most everybody is doing better. It's still not a great industry because all those again, they didn't recertify them. They didn't revoke them. So all that capacity, all that illegal capacity is still there. And even with a Supreme Court ruling that says these guys are going to be held responsible, they're still loading these guys. And that's because the hammer hasn't really dropped yet.

[00:17:12] There hasn't really been a verdict on these on these these these freight brokers to really let them know that this is a different time. I think that's coming. I think they're going to face that soon. And you're really going to start to see a better trucking industry come out of this. Well, praise God for that, because it's absolutely outrageous, Shannon, to hear things like this. You think it's out of a Tom Clancy novel or some sort of historical fiction or an author who wants to paint a postmodern world.

[00:17:42] But we're seeing it right now with with just the fraud, waste and abuse, not only in this government and what's been exposed, but also something that is really affecting lives and killing people. That's completely preventable. And again, not only hurting the bottom line of American workers and American truckers, but putting those victims, as you put it, missiles put right behind them on the freeways and highways of America.

[00:18:10] So we have the Supreme Court situation. But there are there existing laws as they stand right now waiting for that hammer to drop that would allow these regulations to. To. Prosecute or hold accountable the violators of taking people's lives to licensing standards, to putting really unqualified drivers on the road. It's a terrible thing to look at because I'm thinking like this.

[00:18:39] I'm I'm not a CDL driver. I have my driver's license, but I have insurance. God forbid I make a mistake on the road to protect my fellow drivers and ultimately my life as well. But there seems to be this double standard, as you so eloquently pointed out, when it comes to the CDLs. Yeah, there absolutely is. And, you know, one of the things so I you know what we advocate for not only these trucking companies, but also for these crash victims. And so I get I get to talk to these families quite a bit.

[00:19:06] And probably another egregious thing that really shocks most people. We live in a high trust society. And so I think our lawmakers and our regulators never sat back and envisioned a time where we would be sitting here with a hundred, a couple hundred thousand illegal alien truck drivers driving around that aren't qualified and aren't being properly monitored. And so nobody has written statutory code to really to really to set a precedent for what happens

[00:19:32] when a guy who come across the border illegally went through a fake school, did everything wrong, was driving over 20 hours and he kills a family of three. What criminal charges do we assess to him? There's there's none. There's none that exists. And so in a lot of cases, these guys are being charged with misdemeanors or they're just being let go. They're being released. Even if they're sent back to their home country, they're they're coming back in.

[00:19:56] In the case in the case of Deanne Miller out in Colorado, she's one of our dear clients or advocates. And she she talks about how the guy who killed her husband, Scott, had already come into the country 16 times, 16 times and was deported a 17th time after after he killed Scott and was and was deported after this after this crash. And so we need we need criminal charges.

[00:20:22] And you cannot expect the federal government to come to the rescue on this. We've we've been advocating for this at a state level. We've been advocating for it at a federal level. Unfortunately, a lot of these multibillion dollar brokerages have a lot of influence over this process. And so I really believe to see change, we're going to have to see a grassroots movement inside of the states to say that, hey, you know, enough is enough.

[00:20:52] Yes, we might have reciprocity between licensing in Arkansas and Tennessee and in in Kentucky. And that's because we're operating under the same guidelines. We're all operating under the same understanding. But when you have a state like California or you have a state like New York take it upon themselves to start issuing commercial driver's licenses to illegal aliens,

[00:21:13] I believe at that point they have broken our trust and we should no longer extend reciprocity to that state for the for the CDLs that they're issuing, especially the non domiciled CDLs that are exclusive to these illegal aliens. And so, California, issue all the licenses that you want, but make those drivers stay in your state and endanger your citizens. Don't send them to our states and on our highways. If you want to partake in that, then you need to partake in the results of that.

[00:21:44] Yes. And it's people want accountability, Shannon, as you are so well pointing out. And I like to add that Tea Party Patriots Action and T-Pari Patriots Citizens Fund is with you because throughout the southeast, our home state here is in Georgia, the Peach State. However, we can assist with that at the state legislative level with brand new governors also coming into office.

[00:22:10] Please let us know how we can do so because that is so true with the reciprocity. You have to uphold your end of the bargain. And we see these these rogue states violating their own laws in many cases while anticipating to point the finger at someone else. But thanks to the interstate system, you have to follow the laws of the land there on the books.

[00:22:33] But is there something when it comes to the responsibilities the truck trucking companies themselves should have to verify that the drivers meet all applicable federal laws? Because we know that this can be implemented through the states, like you said. But there are many federal laws being violated as well.

[00:22:53] Yeah. So, you know, we've got we've got a federal agency that's responsible for going out and inspecting and doing audits on these carriers to make sure that these drivers are properly qualified. And they did receive the credentials properly. And so absolutely, we need more enforcement on a federal level. But here's the here's the deal. We have no federal law enforcement officers for the trucking industry. That's all deputized down to our state agencies.

[00:23:20] And so it is our state agencies that are enforcing the federal law. And so it's really going to fall back. It's going to continue to fall back to the states and it's going to continue to be. They need to they need to be pushing back on these other states who are breaking their part of the bargain. You know, the the the the the trust has been broken on the non domicile CDLs.

[00:23:45] And then it's and then it comes down to interpretation to these Mexico or these international CDLs. Right now, especially in the state of Georgia and in Arkansas and Tennessee, if you go out and you see these trucks that have Mexico plates on the front of them, those those drivers in most cases, I would say probably I was just out here at an operation just this week. And over 95 percent of the drivers are U.S. Domicile carriers using Mexican CDLs.

[00:24:13] Well, there's nowhere in the federal guidelines that allows a U.S. Trucking Company to employ a foreign national on a temporary visitor visa. There is there is some language in the in the FMCSA federal guidelines that allows a Mexican trucking company to come into the United States. It doesn't say what point it says a point and then to go back to Mexico when that worked well for our country.

[00:24:39] Before we had this problem, they stayed within the commercial trade zone or the border trade zones near their port of entry. So if a guy comes in from, say, Salado, Guanajuato and he's got a load going to Detroit, Michigan, we should not be allowing a guy who received some, you know, unknown credential from Mexico, probably bought. That's been the case in a lot of investigations that we've done that can't speak English to drive all the way up to Michigan.

[00:25:08] He should come like they historically did come into the border trade zone in the United States, cross into Laredo, drop his trailer, pick up a trailer going back to Mexico and head back south to Mexico. We should not be allowing all of this travel through our country, especially on these visitor visas. If you look at the violators of the English proficiency violation and who are being put out of service, the vast majority, the number one violator is the state of Texas.

[00:25:34] And that's because they're allowing U.S. domicile trucking companies to employ people from Mexico to work for these U.S. trucking companies and then sending them to all of your states. And so the people need to push back and say, hey, Texas, what are you doing? Why are you allowing this loophole to be exploited and to endanger our citizens in Georgia or to endanger our citizens in Arkansas? And so absolutely, you know, there's there's things there's going to be challenges between what the states can do and what the feds say we can do.

[00:26:04] But right now we've got Secretary Duffy as the as the director of transportation. We've got a Trump administration that is that has come out and advocating they're publicly supporting all of these moves to make our roads safer and to clean up these highways. And so now's the time to do it. Now's the time for states to to enact code and to and to come forward and say, here's what I want to do to protect the people of Georgia and to work with the administration to get that done.

[00:26:27] And Governor Greg Abbott is always welcome on The Jenny Beth Show to maybe clarify some of what's happening in the Lone Star State, because clearly this is bipartisan. Shannon, what's the biggest violators at California? Is it New York? Is it Illinois? But you mentioning Texas, I had no clue that that was coming throughout the country through the southern border. We knew that with an open porous southern border, but I was not aware when it came to the trucking industry.

[00:26:55] And I'm sure many are not because this should be front page headline news. But we've seen the law lose some investigative journalism in this country. Yeah. So we've got two types of credentials. You've got the non domicile CDL and then you've got these these Mexico CDLs, really. And so as it applies to the non domicile CDL, your worst offenders are absolutely California, New York, Ohio and Pennsylvania.

[00:27:23] When it comes to this Mexico CDL loophole, obviously most of our trade is coming through Texas. And so the reason Texas is is high on that list is because they've got most of the activity, but they've also got all the violators. And so as it applies to non domicile. And so it is it's a nonpartisan issue, really, because what we're talking about here is highway safety. I think every leader, every governor, whether it's a red state or a blue state, wants the citizens of their state to be safe on the highways.

[00:27:54] And so it's really getting through the noise that's coming out of the powerful lobbying groups that want the cheap labor. OK, it's really getting past that, whether that's in D.C. or whether that's in the statehouse and understanding that, man, it doesn't make sense to trade our safety so that somebody can save a couple pennies off of a of a of a of a load of meat or a load. Because here's the deal. When it comes down to transportation cost of goods,

[00:28:21] the transportation good cost of goods only represents about two to three percent of the cost of an entire shipment of a load. So say you've got a seventy thousand dollar load of chicken. Right. Well, the average invoice for that load for the transportation of that is probably going to be within that two thousand dollars. OK, so it's going to be inside of it's going to be inside of three percent. And so even if they're saving half of half of the cost of labor by using this unqualified truck driver,

[00:28:50] well, the labor only represents a third of the three percent. It only represents one percent. OK. And so you're talking about one half of one percent for you to for you to buy an American truck driver who's qualified, trained following all the rules and all the standards. I think Americans deserve that. And I don't think anybody cares if we pay the right fee. Who does care are the people that are that are shaving that off the top and putting that towards their earnings per share. They're putting that in the bank and they don't want to give that up.

[00:29:18] And so that's really the battle here. I think all of our leaders want to do the right thing. It's it's who are they listening to? Are they listening to the ones that are shaving off that half of a percent of that one percent? Are they listening to the people that have been involved in these crashes or that have lost their businesses due to this due to this crisis? Yes, it seems like common sense to me. And as you mentioned, a nonpartisan issue at hand. But what should the public watch next?

[00:29:44] As of this recording in late October, we're talking Delilah's law. How can the people follow its progress through Congress? And do you think that in the lame duck session, something could move before the next Congress is sworn in on January 3rd? Well, we've got we've got something very critical that's coming up right now. And that is there has been a lawsuit filed against Secretary Duffy's non domicile ruling.

[00:30:10] An appeals court hurt took up that case and heard it, I want to say, mid-September. So we're waiting to hear the the court's decision on that lawsuit. We're confident that the court will make the right decision and uphold Secretary Duffy's ruling that requires all these drivers to be properly processed and qualified. But there is a risk.

[00:30:35] There is a risk that that could go the wrong way and completely unwind what Secretary Duffy and President Trump has accomplished over the last year. That that ruling could drop any day now. OK, then when it comes to Delilah's law, so that makes Delilah's law even more important because we got to codify what Duffy was doing. But also we got to recertify and revoke the ones that got issued and get them off of the road.

[00:31:01] And so there's a there's a huge battle right now for that to kind of go either way. But depending on how the appeals court goes, no matter what, we got to get it codified through Delilah's law. But be but be paying attention to what this what this court decides. Incredible. I'll be watching it very closely. We may have to have you back on, Shannon, to break all of that down, because I am just outraged by this story.

[00:31:26] And I feel like every American should be following it, because, as you said, we're talking about minuscule costs, even with higher gas prices at the time versus saving lives. And it's the most innocent among us, the best among us with the brightest futures. American roads should be safe, period. Now, critics, we have to look at what they'll argue about, saying that it may discriminate against undocumented illegal aliens

[00:31:55] and the flow of goods here in America. What say you as a response? Yeah. So, again, we're asking that you follow the same processes that have always been the standards of the American trucking industry. I don't think it's too much. I don't think it's discriminatory to say that you have to have the proper training from a proper school,

[00:32:19] that you have to have a proper you know, we support Secretary Duffy's ruling that allows specific work visas. So we're saying we're not completely against immigration. We're saying it has to be legal immigration and it has to be a legal process. And so, you know, get the legal visa, go to the proper school, receive the proper training, receive the proper testing,

[00:32:43] speak English, and then make sure that that's monitored and controlled and somebody's following up and overseeing that process. And then there's an allowance for that. And when it comes to the disruption, when it comes to the disruptions of goods, the problem is not that we – so that's one of the reasons – that's how we got here really was the financial or the special interest groups

[00:33:08] that kind of pushed all of this were using a driver shortage as the excuse to bring in all of these drivers and to bring them in so quickly. We don't really have a driver shortage. What we have is an abuse of driver's time. We have an abuse of driver's pay and their benefits and their quality of life and their standard of life, so much so that we forced them to compete with all of these guys who aren't following the rules. They're not following the regulations.

[00:33:34] And so they cannot make a good quality of life or a good standard of living in competing with – by following the rules when they're competing with a bunch of guys that don't. Okay? So it's – of course, you're going to create your own shortage when you pump in drivers that are having to operate under one standard and have them compete against the other. And so would it be disruptive to the American trucking industry if we got rid of all of the unqualified, untrained truck drivers?

[00:34:03] Absolutely not. Absolutely not. Because there are ways in our system right now where we can stop abusing driver's time, not making them wait eight hours at a dock, six hours at a dock, improve their efficiency and their productivity to make up for this. What we think is about a 20 percent – we think there's about 20 percent of the market right now is being controlled by these non-domicile and these international CDLs. Well, we're wasting way more than that than the 20 percent in a ridiculous hours of service regulation

[00:34:33] that the drivers are having to follow where they can only work 11 hours a day or drive 11 hours a day and in the abuse of time that they're having at the docks because really the shippers don't care whether a guy's having to sit six or seven hours at a dock because they're used to all of these indentured servants coming in and not complaining and not holding them accountable. And so they're abusing the American workers. And, of course, Americans don't want to participate in it. So let's change the hours of service, but stop abusing driver's time,

[00:35:02] and let's get all of the unsafe drivers off the road. I think that is a great idea. I like where your head's at, Shannon, in order to do this for all of the whole of America in traveling and also for the industry itself. So what could this legislation ultimately mean for the trucking workforce, shipping costs, and American consumers? Because what you just explained reminded me of what they were telling me way back in high school.

[00:35:31] Oh, Americans don't want these jobs anymore. Well, you know, 20 plus years later, that was a bunch of hogwash, just as you mentioned with some of these ridiculous arguments that somehow it will affect the entire industry. You know, as long as we can work together to identify what it is that's causing the driver, the American driver, not to want to do the work, and we address those issues at the same time that we address this crisis, there won't be any impact.

[00:35:59] It will not be noticeable to the American consumer. Again, that labor savings that they're having, even though it adds up to billions of dollars for these corporations that are shaving it off, to the American consumer, it comes down to less than one half of 1%. And if Delilah's law becomes law, God willing it does based on what we've heard, not only from you and the experts in the industry, but also reading the letter of the bill.

[00:36:27] Again, I really recommend people to go look at H.R. 5688, passed on March 18th of 2026. As of this recording in late October, we are still awaiting for that to get through Congress. But if Delilah's law does become law, Shannon, what measurable difference should American families expect to see on the roads? And how soon should they expect to see it? Well, you'll just see more of what you're already seeing.

[00:36:54] Ever since the President Trump and Secretary Duffy has started their crackdown over the last year, we've already seen the number of fatal accidents drop. And so you're going to see more of that. You're going to see safer highways. You're going to see better conditions for the traveling. You're going to stop seeing these trucks pass you 100 miles an hour, flying into the rear ends of these stalled traffic. And you're going to start to see people in your community say, hey, it might not be a bad idea for me to go drive a truck. You know, that seems like a good career.

[00:37:24] You know, you're going to start seeing people in your community that don't have hope or don't have many career options to start saying, well, maybe I should go drive a truck and be a part of that. And so I believe you're going to see safer highways, safer roads, more job opportunities in a prospering trucking industry. And I don't know if he's doing it. If he's watching the show, Michael Ranke was a friend back in high school, always talked about hitting the open road and enjoying seeing all of the gorgeous views

[00:37:52] and the America that we know that has just about everything from sea to shining sea, mountains, desert, and those lush plains to the green pastures we find, especially east of the Mississippi and down in SEC country where it is the Sun Belt. Shannon Everett of American Truckers United. Thank you so much for joining us here on the Jenny Beth Show.

[00:38:20] Please come back and see us as soon as this wonderful law gets through, because we want more of your take as the weeks and months go on here. Thank you, Robert. If you enjoyed today's conversation, go ahead and hit like and subscribe. It really helps us reach more people who care about liberty and the Constitution. You can find this and other episodes at JennyBestShow.com, as well as Facebook, YouTube, Rumble, Instagram, X, and your favorite podcast platform.

[00:38:50] The Jenny Beth Show is hosted by Jenny Beth Martin. The Jenny Beth Show is a production of Tea Party Patriots Action. For more information, visit teapartypatriots.org. The Jenny Beth Show is followed by Michael Faham. Thank you. you you