Mexico Trucker Online

An independent evaluation panel’s report on the U.S.-Mexico cross-border trucking demonstration project prepared at the request of Secretary of Transportation Mary E. Peters, definitively shows that Mexican domiciled trucks can operate safely and in compliance with all US laws and USDOT regulations.

The report was prepared by Mortimer L. Downey III, chairman of the board of PB Consult Inc., James T. Kolbe, senior advisor at McLarty Associates and a professor in the college of business at the University of Arizona, and Kenneth M. Mead, a special consultant at Baker Botts LLP and former inspector general of the Department of Transportation.

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The Mexican Cross Border Pilot Program enters it 13 month without incident, accident or serious safety violations, the FMCSA has a medical review committee trying to rewrite the requirements for CDL medical examiners and the critics of the Pilot Program continue to insist that that requirements for a Mexican CDL or Licencia Federal Conductor are lax or non existent.

Once again, Mexico Truckers proves them wrong and exposes these outlandish claims being made by Jimmy Hoffa, Todd Spencer and the staff at Landline Now.

Let’s take a look at the medical requirements for a Mexican driver. They are very similar to what is being proposed for future rule making by the FMCSA. But wait! The FMCSA is still just kicking these requirements around, while in Mexico, they have been law for many years.

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On September 24, 2008, the USDOT Office of Inspector General issued an audit report entitled REPORT ON THE SCOPE AND METHODOLOGY OF FMCSA’S REVIEW OF CANADIAN/MEXICAN COMPLIANCE WITH FEDERAL COMMERCIAL MOTOR VEHICLE SAFETY STANDARDS.

Of course OOIDA jumped on this report with an article erroneously entitled Data flawed on Mexican truck safety reg compliance A glance would make you believe that Mexican trucks are not in compliance with FMCSA safety regs and this is not the case!

Steve Sommers on America’s Trucking Network told his few listeners that this report PROVES that Mexican trucks are not in compliance and, by the way Steve, thanks for the mention of the website here. That wasn’t too hard was it! But he wanted his listeners to feel vindicated by their beliefs that Mexican trucks don’t meet US standards. Again, Steve didn’t bother to read the report. Or, maybe he did and this was his way of continuing to spread his misinformation about Mexican trucks

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The House has made it veto-proof clear: The controversial pilot program allowing big Mexican trucks to cross the U.S. border and travel into the country must end.

The Senate has yet to act, though. And Mexico and its U.S. big-business allies are ramping up their efforts to block the repeal, including a renewed warning by Mexican officials to retaliate against U.S. exports if the program is abolished.

So begins an excellent article on the Mexican Cross Border Program from a neutral perspective, in a story published at Politico.com

And the proponents should continue to fight to keep this program which is a legal obligation we have under the terms of the NAFTA agreement that we signed with Canada and Mexico.

The article points out what we’ve been saying all along, that this has nothing to do with truck safety, concern for the safety of other motorists or any of the myriad of excuses that have come from the opposition.

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The home team trails in the third quarter as the underdog visitors steadily advance the ball. Coaches are nervous; fans are grumbling. Desperate for a turnaround, the home team announces a surprise rule change: From now on, the visitors are banned from crossing the 50-yard line.

Sounds absurd, but that’s what Congress proposes to do with NAFTA, the free-trade accord it approved in 1993. Sure, NAFTA might not be a crowd pleaser. It is, however, a treaty that legally binds the United States. The rules don’t change just because the home team is in trouble.

NAFTA has always included provisions to grant U.S., Mexican and Canadian truckers access to one another’s shipping routes. Bipartisan majorities in both houses of Congress, yielding to pressure from the Teamsters, voted last week to halt a year-old pilot program that allowed a few dozen properly inspected, safe Mexican trucks to haul cargo deep within U.S. territory.

Short of using actual facts, the Teamsters and truckers groups have done everything possible to feed the worst stereotypes about the dangers of Mexican trucks on U.S. highways.

It’s harder when facts get in the way:

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Those who have followed the debate on the Mexican Cross Border Program, might have noticed as time passed, Todd Spencer and OOIDA for example kept changing their reasons for opposing FMCSA Cross Border Program. First it was “Safety issues”, then economic issues, both which have been debunked here and in other places.

Jimmy Hoffa continues to rant about those “dangerous and unsafe” Mexican trucks putting the American motoring public at risk, without offering one iota of proof to back up his accusations.

Even Steve Sommers on America’s Trucking Network has toned down the rhetoric, insisting his opposition to the program is from the viewpoint of American’s losing jobs, which ain’t gonna happen.

So what the truth behind the opposition? Could it be pure old “Mexican bashing”, the xenophobia  that is sweeping America, pushed in part by groups who are preying on the fear and insecurities of Americans, while putting their hands in the pockets of those who respond to their promises of ridding America of Mexicans? I think the truth lies somewhere in between.

Let’s backtrack 15 months to June 22, 2007 and an article that appeared in the Pittsburgh Tribune Review in reponse to an Editorial by Trib staff titled MEXICAN BACKFIRE Dimitri Vassilaros came across with this scathing and totally false editorial.

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