MEXICAN TRUCKS: Murray Includes Language in Bill Urging Administration to Act

U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA) ^ | July 26, 2010 | U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA)

[mdittmar]

Sets deadline of October 1, 2010 for Administration to act

(Washington, D.C.) –U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA) included language in the Fiscal Year 2011 Transportation, Housing and Urban Development (THUD) Appropriations bill that calls on the Administration to put forward a plan that would end retaliatory tariffs on Washington state agricultural products by October 1, 2010. The bill passed the THUD subcommittee, which Murray chairs, as well as the full Appropriations committee, and will now head to the full Senate for consideration.

“I am extremely frustrated that the Administration has not yet acted while farmers across my home state of Washington continue to suffer under Mexico’s retaliatory tariffs,” said Senator Patty Murray. “I am urging both the Obama Administration and the Mexican government to solve this issue and allow Washington state farmers to compete on a level playing field. Since there has been inaction for too long, I included specific language in the transportation spending bill giving the Administration a clear deadline of October 1, 2010 to solve this problem.”

[patlin]

read the report..these trucks are NOT held to the same standard as US & Canadian carriers and thus the reason the program was scrapped...it was nothing more then progressive pandering foreign policy political correctness gone bad!

http://www.ooida.com/OOIDA%20Foundation/Issues/mexican_trucks.html

[Brilliant]

Why is she blaming this on Obama? Isn’t Seattle one of the “sanctuary cities?” You can’t touch those truck drivers.

[Brilliant]

Boycott Washington State!!!

[mdittmar]

Don't know about the data,don't care.

Patty Murray supports Illegal Aliens,and I get Truckers on the road as fast as I can,That's my job.

[1rudeboy]

Well, I’m afraid we’ve reached an impasse: the NHTSA has claimed for years that the Mexican trucks involved in the pilot program have U.S.-approved insurance carriers, and your website claims that the liability standards are different (kinda’ funny, if you think about it).

[1rudeboy]

I was speaking generally, thanks for posting the thread.

[patlin]

It just irks me that these people come out and campaign for that which they have no personal knowledge of. This is what happens when irresponsible & unscrupulous companies allow these types to operate on the open road. The following pics shows what happened while we were PARKED at the fuel islands at the Flying J, Harrisonville, MO. The truck that ran our truck over was owned by a "SELF INSURED" American company out of Phoenix The trucks tags (prorate license) had expired, the drivers DID NOT hold valid CDL's, they were both students & they spoke little English but yet they were allowed to drive away while we where left with the damages & a truck that was deemed inoperable. Did it make the lamestream media? Of course NOT!

[patlin]

Obama axed the NAFTA program, probably because he HATES the trucking industry, but he is embolden to the unions, thus the unions won out. But now it is hitting the WA agriculture industry which is the bread & butter to many states as well as the economic establishment of this country from its founding.

[1rudeboy]

You have the photos: what was the name of the trucking company, what was its USDOT number, who was its insurance carrier, where and when did the accident happen, how did you get the photos, and why are you “irked” because people on the internet expect accurate information?

[mdittmar]

Don’t care about Union Drivers,or Independents,when you you back in,I do my job,I’ll get you back on the road.

[patlin]

The company was SWIFT; USDOT# 54283 which has one of the LOWEST DOT ratings and has been under investigation for years. Their history is not a pretty one, especially their authority & insurance record, both having been revoked or denied several times in their short life as a company. We have been in business since 1976 & have had the same insurance company since day one.

http://li-public.fmcsa.dot.gov/reports/rwservlet

Review Date: 03/04/2010
Type: Non-Ratable

Type Fatal Injury Tow Total
Crashes 32 447 981 1460

Inspection Type Vehicle Driver Hazmat
Inspections 22201 42565 772
Out of Service 3109 963 24

[patlin]

a good driver is a good driver and you are better than I, as there are some who back in that I would not give the time of day until they showed me the proper respect, including certain family members who are also in the business but who we will NEVER go into business with.

[1rudeboy]

Ok, fair enough . . . was Swift operating under the cross-border truck program (doubt it), or somehow relying on illegal drivers who do not speak English (maybe)?

What makes you thing that opposing a cross-border trucking program for 100 trucks will keep the accident from happening?

[Southbound]

Go the truck stop and watch ‘em pull in. American driver gets out, goes in to have coffee......Mexican driver gets out, grabs tool box and starts working on the damn thing.....

[patlin]

Here's the deal...we are NOT opposed to Mexican trucks operating in the US as long as they ARE HELD to the same standards & compliance measures that we are. The point of my posting of our experience with unscrupulous companies that hold no regard as to the laws & regulations was to point out that the US DOT can not even keep track or for that matter, hold accountable big trucking companies who the political establishment has their hands in the pockets of. There is a reason SWIFT is still in business and it has NOTHING to do with complying with the law & now they have a friend at the head of the transportation dept. The US DOT has already shown during that 2 yr trial period it doesn't have the resources or the brass balls to make certain politically protected entities comply. Until Mexico establishes & implements the same standards that Canadian companies have to comply with. They must allow ALL US DOT officials FULL & INSTANT electronic access to the records of all Mexican campany DOT records (including driver info) and until that is in place they should not have full & unfettered access to the 49 mainland states. There are plenty of compliant US trucks to keep the freight moving from the border without subjecting the law abiding citizens of the US to a substandard run Mexican trucking industry who has repeatedly been caught trying to smuggle illegals & drugs. A substandard industry that isn't even required to carry enough insurance to cover their cargo, let alone liability in the case of a physical or personal injury accident. Which brings me back to SWIFT:

There are however, carriers operating beyond the commercial zone from Mexico that are 55% American owned many of which will be self-insured. (Swift, J.B. Hunt, Celadon are self-insured)

[patlin]

....Mexican driver gets out, grabs tool box and starts working on the damn thing.....

you're assuming that they even make it to the truck stop, it isn't just paper litter along the border highways & interstates. Especially between Nogales & Tucson.

[patlin]

Swift owns 100% of Trans-Mex, a Nuevo Laredo, Mexico-based carrier. Swift offers border-crossing services at all major Mexican border crossings and also maintains a presence in every Canadian province.

http://www.swifttruckingjobs.com/about.php

from the OOIDA review:

I think we should ask if these Mexican carriers are actually Mexican domiciled and 100% Mexican owned carriers. If they are not; it is not a true representation of the Mexican carrier population. If any of the carriers are 51% or more American owned then they are not truly a Mexican carrier and an economic effect study needs to be done on how an American owned carrier would be given an undue economic advantage over other carriers; propagated and encouraged by the FMCSA.

Stifel Nickolaus just reviewed for their clients whether it is advisable to invest in Celadon, June 15, 2007, by noting: If the border were to open, Celadon could benefit to the tune of $8 million per year in cost savings if it were to run its 350 trucks in service across the border. The savings are related mostly to the lower rate per mile provided to Mexican drivers. Currently, drivers domiciled in the U.S. average $0.40 per mile in compensation while it is envisioned that Mexican drivers would earn only $0.22 per mile while operating in the U.S.

Has there been an economic impact study as must be done before there can be a regulation change? The Regulatory Flexibility Act requires an evaluation of the effects of an action on small entities and a determination that the action would not have a significant economic impact on a substantial number of small entities. (I don’t think this is required for a pilot study but it should be considered)

•FYI— In Mexico in order to cross the border a carrier must go through a broker. Unlike the U.S. brokers, the brokers in Mexico are legally responsible for the load, therefore, they often own the trucks that do the cross-border transportation or have a deal worked out with a Mexican motor carrier. This will greatly affect the economy of these business people and they are largely opposed to NAFTA. This will of course affect the owner-operators who cannot compete with the poorly paid Mexican drivers.
•Another point is that if a foreign worker gets a work visa in the U.S. the person who hires the worker and sponsors them is required to pay the average wage for that position. Is this even considered, it certainly should be if the carrier in the study is U.S., owned even partially. In fact a quote of Celadon’s President on WISH TV Channel 8 in Indianapolis, “The move could increase Celadon Trucking’s profits by as much as 80 cents a share within the next two years”. This was of course in reference to opening the border not the pilot study but if Celadon, or Jaguar the Mexican counterpart of Celadon, is one of the 100 carriers then it shows who is behind it.

And again I remind you:

There are however, carriers operating beyond the commercial zone from Mexico that are 55% American owned many of which will be self-insured. (Swift, J.B. Hunt, Celadon are self-insured)

SWIFT stands to profit considerably from reopening this program due to the fact it can hire substandard Mexican based drivers at much lower cost than the more heavily regulated US CDL holding driver. It's all about the bottom line, to hell with safety standards. It's all about the political establishment in power & how full they can fill their political coffers by the deals they make and there's more political hay to be made from the Mexican trucking industry than the US agriculture industry so I see Murray's bill dieing a slow painful death.

[patlin]

by political hay and Murray's bill dieing, I mean that the political winds have shifted & it now is NOT fashionable to be taking to political bribes, just ask Rangel how that is helping him these days. I wouldn't look to the ag business, I would check into Murray's political connections/campaign contributions from the US owned border crossing trucking businesses and their cohorts(extensive subsidiaries aka their insurance divisions).

[1rudeboy]

Either your truck is compliant, or it is not. You appear to be advocating higher standards for every truck but your own. That's BS.

And if you were truly concerned about unsafe trucks, you wouldn't divide them out according to nationality.

Finally, Murray caved because the Mexican retalitory tariffs came down hard on her State. They were designed to do so. Stop it with the bullcrap about some cross-border trucking/insurance company conspiracy.

[patlin]

You appear to be advocating higher standards for every truck but your own... Murray caved because the Mexican retalitory tariffs came down hard on her State.

Higher standards BUT our own? Where do you got off with that? When did I say anything of the sort? I merely stated that they should be REQUIRED to adhere to the SAME standards we are, standards they were NOT made to adhere to during the pilot period.

As far as the tariffs go, WA state is only 1 of many ag states that was affected so go cry yourself a river. If Murray was playing on the side of America, she would push for higher tariffs on ALL Mexican & South American products coming INTO the US through the southern border. Who's side is she on anyway? You play fire with fire, not with political correctness. A lot of what comes through the southern border is NOT from Mexico, it is from South America because shipping it through Mexico is cheaper for those countries than shipping it directly to our coastal ports. As far as I am concerned, the North American Free Trade Agreement helps every one BUT the US because of the blatant abuse by South American countries who utilize Mexico to keep from paying the rightful tariffs they should be paying.