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  1. #1

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    Mexican truckers to be given full access of U.S. roads

    http://wpherald.com/articles/5237/1/Mex ... proar.html


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    Mexican truckers to be given full access of U.S. roads
    By Sean Lengell | Published Jun/25/2007 | Business , Latin America , North America | Rating:

    U.S. Congress reacts with bipartisan uproar


    By Sean Lengell
    The Washington Times

    WASHINGTON -- A Bush administration plan to proceed with a pilot program to give Mexican truckers full access of U.S. roads has caused a bipartisan uproar on Capitol Hill.

    "The cross-border trucking program is bad for America," said Rep. Duncan Hunter, California Republican and presidential candidate. "It appears, under the current program, that commercial interests are being pushed ahead of the safety and security interests of the American people."

    The Teamsters union and the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association, a trade association representing the independent truck owner-operators and professional drivers, also oppose the program, saying Mexican trucking companies have poor safety figures, do not keep reliable records on accidents, and do not dependably test drivers for drugs and alcohol.

    "It's apparent the Bush administration is thumbing its nose at the will of the American people and Congress," said Todd Spencer, executive vice president of the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association.

    Mexican-registered trucks are allowed to make deliveries and pickups in the U.S. only within special commercial zones along the U.S.-Mexican border that extend up to about 70 miles inside U.S. territory. But several months ago, President Bush announced plans for a Department of Transportation test program to begin this summer that would permit 100 Mexican-based trucking companies to travel anywhere in the U.S.

    Democrats and Republicans on Capitol Hill complained the program would pose serious safety concerns, and the House last month voted 411-3 to place a series of restrictions on Mexican trucks and their drivers, designed to delay the administration's program indefinitely.

    The Safe American Road Act was sponsored by Rep. Nancy Boyda, Kansas Democrat. Ten of the 52 co-sponsors were Republicans.

    "We're going to have a major accident somewhere, and people are going to say, 'How did this happen?' " said Rep. Bob Filner, California Democrat, on the House floor just before the May 14 vote.

    The Senate has not taken up its version of the House's bill.

    The Transportation Department, however, says that Mexican trucking companies are only required to meet safety criteria included in the Iraq war supplemental-spending bill signed into law by Mr. Bush on May 25, and is proceeding with its plan to allow Mexican trucks into the country.

    "We're dealing with the bill that was already signed into law," said Melissa Mazzella DeLaney, a spokeswoman with the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, which is part of the Transportation Department. "We're certainly very committed to this program. It's one of the top priorities in the department right now."

    The Transportation Department said it won't give Mexican truckers access to U.S. roads until its inspector general completes an audit of the program. The department also must wait until the conclusion of a public comment period that ends on Thursday.

    The agency hopes to start the program no later than the end of the year, Ms. DeLaney said.

    The new pilot program was designed to simplify a process that currently requires Mexican truckers to stop and wait for U.S. trucks to arrive and transfer cargo. The process wastes money, drives up the cost of goods, and leaves trucks loaded with cargo idling inside U.S. borders, the department says.

    The new program also allows for an equal number of U.S. trucking companies to make deliveries and pickups in Mexico. Participating Mexican companies must be insured with a U.S.-licensed firm and meet all U.S. safety standards.

    Companies that meet the standards will be allowed to make international pickups and deliveries. They will not be allowed to move goods from one part of the U.S. to another, haul hazardous materials or transport passengers.

    Drivers must meet a list of safety criteria before being allowed into the U.S., such as having a valid commercial driver's license, proof they are medically fit, a willingness to comply with U.S. hours-of-service rules, and an understanding of questions and directions in English.

    But many on Capitol Hill say those requirements are not enough, and have chastised the Transportation Department for proceeding with the program despite public and congressional opposition.

    "DOT's simple assertion, that Mexican truckers scheduled to enter the United States had already been in compliance with the newly enacted guidelines, cannot be accepted at face value," Mr. Hunter said.

    Mr. Spencer said the Transportation Department is ignoring a well-thought-out piece of legislation, in the Safe American Road Act. It "would have injected some sanity into a program that still has too many safety and security issues that have yet to be resolved," he said.

    Mexican trucks were allowed free rein on U.S. roads before 1982, when the U.S. began confining them to commercial zones around major border towns. Access to all U.S. highways was promised by 2000 under the 1993 North American Free Trade Agreement, as was access through Mexico for U.S. carriers.

    That aspect of NAFTA was stalled by President Clinton, who said Mexican trucks didn't meet U.S. safety and environmental standards. Because of this U.S. refusal, the Mexican government barred U.S. trucks into that country.

    Canadian and U.S. trucks travel freely across the northern border.

    But in 2004, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled unanimously the Bush administration could open U.S. roadways to Mexican trucks without first doing an environmental study.


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    More Info On this Issue can be found at

    http://www.ooidacalltoaction.com/mexico_border


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  2. #2
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    Wow, imagine that, Bush putting the interest of busniess's ahead of the interest of the American people. This guy has got to be the BIGGEST LOSER to ever hold office. Even the transexual presidents were better then this guy, HELL EVEN CLINTON WAS BETTER THEN THIS CLOWN.
    "If you always do what You've always done, You'll always get what you always got!"

    “If you ain’t mad, you ain’t paying attention.â€

  3. #3
    Administrator Jean's Avatar
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    "It's apparent the Bush administration is thumbing its nose at the will of the American people and Congress," said Todd Spencer, executive vice president of the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association.
    That's one of Jorge's worst flaws, he does what he wants.
    Support our FIGHT AGAINST illegal immigration & Amnesty by joining our E-mail Alerts at https://eepurl.com/cktGTn

  4. #4

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    The more I read about Duncan Hunter, though, the more I like this guy.

  5. #5
    Senior Member SOSADFORUS's Avatar
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    One bad accident and people are going to be outraged!! If the news even tells us about it!!
    Please support ALIPAC's fight to save American Jobs & Lives from illegal immigration by joining our free Activists E-Mail Alerts (CLICK HERE)

  6. #6
    Senior Member blkkat99's Avatar
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    Another major issue for us to start calling about!
    Alot of your major owned trucking companies are owned by drug cartels!
    They will use these trucks as ways of smuggling more drugs and illegals into the country!

  7. #7
    wmb1957's Avatar
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    Public comments can be made at https://dms.dot.gov/submit/index.cfm?regs=

    The Docket No. is FMCSA-2007-28055

    Comments can be read by doing an advanced search at

    http://dms.dot.gov/search/searchFormAdvanced.cfm

    Use FMCSA for the Agency and 28055 for the Docket Number.

  8. #8
    Senior Member tinybobidaho's Avatar
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    I didn't see when they were going to start, but I'll find out on Monday. We need to make this one a top priority, guys. Rep. Virgil Goode said he can stop this thing if the people complain to Congress and got H.R.CON.RES.40 passed.
    RIP TinybobIdaho -- May God smile upon you in his domain forevermore.

    Join our efforts to Secure America's Borders and End Illegal Immigration by Joining ALIPAC's E-Mail Alerts network (CLICK HERE)

  9. #9

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    Quote Originally Posted by tinybobidaho
    I didn't see when they were going to start, but I'll find out on Monday. We need to make this one a top priority, guys. Rep. Virgil Goode said he can stop this thing if the people complain to Congress and got H.R.CON.RES.40 passed.
    Hey Tiny, I just read a very interesting article and I'm going to post it on here. It's an old article, but mexican truck drivers were interviewed and now I'm scared for way more than just American jobs!

    Also, I read on one of the sites today about this that boosh has until the end of the year or something to start the 80,00 pound weapons of mass destruction into our country. I either didn't save the article or I just haven't found that particular passage yet, but I will!

    I'm going to change the headline on this one only because the one they used doesn't really grab a person's attention and if anyone hasn't read this yet...you need to!
    They did extend the deadline for comments from the citizens to the "all-powerfu"l government until July 9th because some of DOT's electronic files were moved and, apparently, tough for people to find.

    I think it'll explain, at least in part, why boosh is in such a hurry to sneak this by the American people in the Iraq Spending Bill...another interesting read.

  10. #10

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    Listen To What Mexican Truck Drivers Say--Coming to US Soon!

    http://www.teamster.org/resources/membe ... /nafta.htm


    There was no date on this article, but just doing the math, I'd say it is about a year old. I think this explains, at least in part, who is going to profit off the manslaughter of American citizens on their own soil. It also is a 'coming straight at you' admission of rampant drug use by drivers and it explains why. Scary stuff!!!

    TinyBob and I are researching this, and I'm not sure who else is, but I agree with Tiny...Please, we need to start calling on this now and hammer it hard!! We have until July 9th to leave comments for the lawmakers or our families will pay the price.

    You can go here to leave comments or you can call your representatives.

    http://dms.dot.gov/search/document.cfm? ... tid=474659



    The NAFTA Trucker: Investigative Reporter Charles Bowden's Story in the November 1999 Issue of The Teamster Told of Exploited, Exhausted, Unsafe Mexican Truck Drivers -- Seven Years Later, Nothing has Changed.

    By Charles Bowden

    There is a plan no one talks about very much, one that floats over the horizon like an approaching storm at sea. In this business dream, the Pacific ports of the United States will be shifted south to new massive anchorages in Mexico even though this increases the shipping distance by 30 percent for all the Asian tonnage. These new ports will be linked by major train and truck arteries -- NAFTA Corridors -- to the cities of the United States and Canada. Mexican trucking companies will be bought (and are being bought up now) by American firms and Mexican truckers will deliver the freight and freely drive all U.S. highways. In this plan, the shipping of the United States leaves union ports and the long haul trucking leaves union drivers.

    An enlarged I-35 will reach north from the sister cities of Laredo/Nuevo Laredo 1,600 miles to Canada via San Antonio, Austin, Dallas/Ft. Worth, Kansas City, the Twin Cities and Duluth and I-69 will originate at the same crossing and streak north to Michigan. Each corridor will be about 1,200 feet wide. Six lanes will be dedicated to cars, four to trucks and in the middle will be rail and utilities. The goods will come from new Mexican ports on the Pacific coast. At the moment, at least five such corridors are on the drawing boards.

    This is the story of some of the drivers who will be used by this plan. They know nothing of this scheme. They are too busy simply surviving to study such matters.

    Professional Secrets

    The five men sit at the truck stop table about 20 kilometers below the Rio Grande at Laredo-Nuevo Laredo on the Texas border. They, or their sons or grandsons, may someday be shock troops on the NAFTA Corridors. Just a few hundred yards from where the men eat and smoke, the major highway coming from the Mexican south forks. One road leads into Nuevo Laredo, the other arcs west and connects just west of the city with a trucking center on the U.S. side by means of the World Trade Bridge. This new bridge and dedicated truck highway is an early link in this NAFTA Corridor. At the moment, 5,800 trucks enter and leave this border crossing each day, a trickle compared to the traffic that will pour north once the new ports, rails and roads come on line by 2025.

    Their small lunch is finished, an empty liter of beer stands before one driver, and at the moment, they smoke and laugh and talk. For a Mexican trucker, life is an endless highway and the moments for conversation and fellowship can be few and far between.

    They don't want their names used because they don't want trouble and life on the roads of Mexico is trouble enough.

    "The longest distance I drive," said a driver about 30 in a black T-shirt, "is from Ensenada to Cancun, 4,500 kilometers. Five days and six nights alone. Tomatoes. The company won't pay for a second driver."

    Ah, but how can a man stay awake and drive for five straight days?

    The table erupts in laughter. The man facing the empty liter of beer smiles and says, "Professional secret." The younger man in the black T-shirt offers one phrase, "Magic dust." There are more smiles and mention of "special chemicals."

    Fighting For Safe Borders
    The Teamsters Union continues to be the major advocate supporting regulatory action and legislative initiatives to ensure that only those foreign trucks that meet all U.S. vehicle safety and emissions standards be permitted access to our nation's highways.

    The lack of an adequate drug and alcohol testing program, the inability of DOT safety inspectors to have access to Mexican facilities to conduct safety fitness reviews, the fact that hours-of-service and logbook regulations are not enforced, are just some of the vehicle and driver standards that need to be addressed before Mexican trucks are permitted to travel beyond the commercial border zones.


    And then they are off, a torrent of words and quips and smiles, and a knowing discussion of that jolt when a line of cocaine locks in. They are all family men who run the highways at least 25 days a month and they are adamant about two things -- that nobody can run these long hauls without cocaine and crystal meth, and now and then some marijuana to level out the rush. And that the biggest danger on their endless runs comes from addicted Mexican truck drivers, which means all truck drivers.

    Dangerous Drivers

    The men earn about $1,100 a month. In Mexico, the cost of living is roughly 80 or 90 percent that of the U.S. The only real bargain in Mexico is labor. Many other items cost more than the U.S. -- the telephone rates are among the highest in the world and a sack of cement or a board foot of lumber costs more than in any American town.

    None of the drivers at the table has driven in the U.S. save for short crossings where they dump the load and instantly return on special routes like the World Trade Bridge.

    The man with the empty beer explains "We make almost nothing -- less than $300 a week. I work 48 hours non-stop. I drive 2,400 kilometers per trip and get no time for turnarounds."

    And every man at the table agrees on their biggest problem -- the government. And by that they mean the police, especially federal, who rob them at will.

    "If you drive to Mexico City," another driver adds, "you are robbed, for sure. Police are the first to rob you. If you report a robbery, the police try to make you the guilty person."

    Trade Deficit
    Flowery predictions about increased trade surpluses for the United States have also wilted over time. NAFTA supporters claimed that the deal would create a $9 billion trade surplus with Mexico within two years. However, the U.S. actually built a $15 billion trade deficit with Mexico in that time period -- a figure that has more than doubled in ensuing years.

    "If there's a positive side to the disastrous legacy of NAFTA, it's that it has made it a little harder for the free trade cabal to wrap their lies around subsequent job-killing deals," said Jim Hoffa, Teamsters General President. "While the House and Senate still have a majority who continue to support the free trade agenda, their ranks have shrunk over the years -- sometimes due to members of Congress changing their minds and sometimes due to voters changing their member of Congress."


    And now the table is rolling, about the bad equipment they are given, about the fact that the owners often stall them on payment, about how there is no escape from the job, that they all know drivers who are still out there on long hauls at 70, how they have all been robbed and hijacked, have all killed people with their trucks and, given the nature of Mexican police, have all fled such accident sites, that they are all doomed to spend their lives on an asphalt treadmill. And so they take pride, enormous pride, in the fact that they can survive the life that has been dealt them.

    "Dust in the Air"

    The basic Mexican trucker is living the life that American truckers once tasted before the Teamsters fashioned over-the-road contracts.

    There are warm moments in this life. Women.

    The men talk with smiles of cachimbas, which means fireplaces. In earlier days on the road, there would be wooden shacks with fires going, roadside brothels. Mexico now has four-lane roads for many truck routes and stouter buildings, but the term cachimba has stuck for truck stops where women and drugs are freely available.

    One man says, "Don't print that. If you do, all those American truckers will want to drive down here."

    A woman costs about $20 and drugs are like dust in the air. A Mexican trucker can get anything at a cachimba but decent food. They all agree that the most beautiful women are on the West Coast route that snakes through the narco state of Sinaloa.

    For a moment, the men are all smiles and then this moment passes.

    "The worst thing," one says with some bitterness, "is not being home. We all have two or three Sanchos," meaning strangers who sleep with their wives when they are gone.

    No Sleep at All

    Francisco Samuel Angiana is around 40 years old and he is out of sorts as he lingers at a truck stop in Santa Ana, Sonora, about 60 miles south of the Nogales, Arizona crossing. This is yet another NAFTA corridor, a sketch on some future map that will eventually be the route for torrents of Mexican truckers moving freight from the planned Mexican ports.

    He was robbed the night before at a truckstop in Caborca, a narco town on the Mexican federal highway that links Baja, California with the Mexican mainland. He points to the hole in his dashboard where his CB radio and regular radio once rested. He is on his basic run from Tijuana to Mexico City. Normally, he is allowed 72 hours for this route, but sometimes he does the express run of 48 hours and then he gets no sleep at all.

    "I have 20 years experience," he adds, "Here you make the rules and take a lot of amphetamines."

    But he tries to live cleanly and so he personally uses massive vitamin doses and various power drinks of caffeine and herbs to keep him rolling. A crucified Christ hangs in one corner of his cab and when he drives he stares at portraits of his wife and three children to keep him moving. On the seat beside him is a laptop computer -- he is constantly monitored by GPS and he is never told what his cargo is for security reasons. He drives at least a 130,000 miles a year, is almost never home and earns maybe $1,100 a month. And he is very intelligent and once planned to be a lawyer before the reality of the Mexican economy put him behind the wheel of a semi.

    Pawns in a Game

    He has been robbed before and tries to be ready for such moments. He hauls out a small baseball bat, and his knife. He demonstrates how he can do a karate kick to the head while seated behind his steering wheel. He is a small man in jeans, blue shirt and cowboy boots and he repeatedly shows me this practiced kick to within an inch of my head.

    Then he brings out his infrared binoculars. At night they prove useful, he explains. He can see lights ahead, stare out through them, and if he sees a federal police roadblock, then he pulls over and tries to find a way around the cops lest they also rob him. He also carries two sets of identification because you never really know who you are dealing with out there on the road. He's been hijacked twice. He points to the photographs of his family and says, "They give me the energy to keep going. If you are alone, no one helps you. It is you and your truck."

    He adds softly, "The hardest part of my job is staying alive."

    He has never heard of the Teamsters Union. But he has a brother in the United States who drives a truck for Wells Fargo.

    "He is constantly telling me to come to the U.S.," Francisco says, "That you only have to work certain hours there."

    But he stays in Mexico.

    Francisco is a proud man all but killing himself on Mexican roads. Now he faces a 1,000-mile leg to Mexico City without the security of his CB. He will drive a gauntlet of Mexican cops and bandits. He'll make his haul, have a few brief moments with his family, and then return to the road.

    He keeps a gallon of water and a liter of apple juice on the floor where he can reach them. He will never stop rolling until he dies. It is very hard to see him and the other truckers as the enemy. They are pawns in a game that has never been explained to them.

    As the truckers in Nuevo Laredo explain their lives to me, lives typical of Mexican truckers like Francisco, a demonstration of 3,000 drivers takes place at the World Trade Bridge. The truckers protest the 90-minute wait they face to cross the bridge, a delay that cuts into their earnings since they are not paid by the hour. No one at the table mentions this since no one at the table believes anything will ever get better.

    La Santisima

    The Murray-Shelby Amendment:
    Bipartisan Measure has Protected U.S. Highways

    Five years ago, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters lobbied for and passed legislation in Congress to protect U.S. drivers and the traveling public from unsafe Mexican trucks. The measure, known as the Murray-Shelby Amendment, was introduced by the bipartisan team of Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) and Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL). After much debate, the Senate voted that summer to include the language in the annual appropriations bill for the Department of Transportation.

    "The provisions on Mexican trucks contained in this bill is a common-sense compromise between the laissez-faire approach of the administration to let Mexican trucks in and check them later, and the strict-protectionist approach of the House to keep Mexican trucks out and not check them at all," Sen. Murray said after the vote. "This bill is neither protectionist nor discriminatory, as some Senators have desperately claimed."

    Earlier in 2001, the Bush administration had called for the opening of the U.S.-Mexican border under the rules of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). However, the Murray-Shelby Amendment established a series of requirements that the Department of Transportation (DOT) must meet in order to ensure thorough inspection and regulation of Mexican trucking companies. Until DOT is able to prove that it has complied no funds can be spent to certify Mexican carriers to operate in the United States.


    I stand in front of the yard of Trans Mex Swift, an American-owned Mexican trucking company. The traffic of the World Trade Bridge roars past. In less than an hour, four truck tires explode. Mexican truckers are not coddled with good rigs or good tires. One semi pulls over. Both tires on the left rear back axle are gone and the trucker stares at rims resting on the pavement. One tire, he explains, went about 150 miles ago, but he had no money with which to buy another one. Now both are gone.

    Politicians, unions and lobbyists will sort out what to do about Mexican truckers coming north. But here on the actual ground, the truckers have sought their own relief. All over the country, a strange figure has appeared in the last five years or so, La Santisima Muerte, Most Holy Death. She is skeletal, wears a long robe, carries a scythe and holds the whole world in her hand. She is recognized by no church or government. But she is known to all who move down these roads.

    At the cloverleaf where the truck traffic spins off the I-35 corridor to the World Trade Bridge, a small tin structure the size of a doll house appeared five years ago. Now three large chapels have come out of the ground and in front of them are two statues of the La Santisima seven or eight feet tall. Semis constantly pull over, engines idling, and the truckers walk to the statues and pray. They leave candy bars, fruits, small coins and burning cigarettes. They ask La Santisima to spare their lives, to protect them on the dangerous roads, to bring them home to their women and children. They speak softly with that careful voice of reverence normally heard only in churches.

    If the free-trade bureaucrats have their way, Mexican truckers will come north and they will be overworked and underpaid and pushed almost beyond human endurance.

    Right now, La Santisima is the only one watching out for them.

    That will have to change or nothing will change at all.


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