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Infuriated Democrats vowed Monday to kill a pilot program that gives Mexican trucks access to U.S. highways after the Bush administration - acting on the first day of Congress' summer recess - announced that it was extending the test project. Rep. James L. Oberstar, chairman of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, said the administration's maneuver was the latest attempt to flout the will of Congress on the matter, and said he will introduce legislation ending the program once and for all. "When Congress reconvenes in September, I intend to have the full House of Representatives approve our bill as quickly...

WASHINGTON – A controversial one-year program allowing Mexican trucks to travel deep into the United States will be extended for two more years, federal officials announced Monday. John H. Hill, administrator of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, said the extension would allow for the collection of more data to determine whether Mexican trucks can operate safely in the United States. Opponents quickly denounced the move, which some had been expecting despite their protests that the program poses a danger on U.S. highways. Rep. James Oberstar, D-Minn., chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, accused U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary...

WASHINGTON – Opponents of a pilot project that allows Mexican trucks to travel throughout the United States took another step toward ending the program yesterday, when a House committee approved a bill to bar its continuation next year. The bill could get a vote by the full House when lawmakers return from their summer break in September. “We believe it's time to end the program,” said Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., the chief sponsor of the bill. DeFazio blasted the Bush administration for ignoring a law passed by Congress last year to end the pilot program. He said lax safety standards...

WASHINGTON – A senator wants Congress' investigative arm to determine whether the Transportation Department has broken the law by spending federal money on a program allowing Mexican trucks on U.S. roads. Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., called for the investigation by the General Accountability Office a few hours after Transportation Secretary Mary Peters warned of economic losses if Mexican trucks are prohibited from driving deep into the U.S. Peters has been fighting in court to prevent the program's end. But Dorgan and others say Congress prohibited spending money on the program last year. “When Congress passes a law that says no...

A federal appeals court considered Tuesday whether the Bush administration can go ahead with a pilot program that allows a small number of Mexican trucks to travel freely on U.S. highways, despite a new law by Congress against it. Members of the Teamsters Union and their supporters packed a courtroom at 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, where an apparently divided three-judge panel heard arguments in the case, which may boil down to the meaning of "establish." Several tractor trailers also were parked outside the courthouse and union members and their supporters carried signs opposing the program, which allows participating...

Trucks hauling everything from cars to produce use Southeast Texas roads to deliver their goods, and when a proposed Interstate 69/Trans Texas Corridor is completed, local drivers could see even more of them, local transportation officials said. The proposed I-69 corridor stretches from Michigan down to Texas. Once in Texas, the corridor goes about 650 miles from Texarkana to Brownsville and Laredo and includes separate lanes for cars and semis and areas for trains and utilities. It doesn't cut through Beaumont, but local arteries like U.S. 69 and Interstate 10 would connect to it. Travelers and truckers just need to...

WASHINGTON – In her first public statements on the Mexican trucking controversy, U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary Peters defended yesterday the pilot program that allows Mexican trucks to travel throughout the United States in defiance of a congressional order. U.S. officials also responded to complaints that a Mexican carrier that withdrew from the program several days ago never should have qualified because of an allegedly poor safety record. Peters got an earful of criticism from several lawmakers during a House appropriations transportation subcommittee hearing on President Bush's proposed budget. Rep. Marcy Kaptur, D-Ohio, accused Peters of being in violation of the...

BELLVILLE — In what is becoming a regular occurrence in Southeast Texas, more than 1,000 Austin County residents and interested outsiders jammed a county fairgrounds exhibit hall Monday night to let a panel of state transportation officials know that the Trans-Texas Corridor was not welcome here. State Rep. Lois Kolkhorst, R-Brenham, opened the public remarks to thunderous applause when she told the panel, "You all thought I was crazy in Austin when I said my people don't want it and I don't want it." The panel, which included Texas Department of Transportation Executive Director Amadeo Saenz and Deputy Executive Director...

Gov. Rick Perry's ambitious Trans-Texas Corridor plan, and his advocacy of toll funding for future roads, hit the skids in a skeptical Legislature last spring. The road shows no signs of getting any smoother as state transportation officials try to sell the plan to Houston-area audiences. "This will wipe me out," Dee Bond told a panel of corridor advocates at a town hall meeting in Rosenberg last week. The panel, which included Texas Transportation Commissioner Ned Holmes of Houston and Steve Simmons, deputy executive director of the Texas Department of Transportation, was there to explain and gather comment on a...

In a letter dated January 3, 2007, written to DOT Secretary Mary Peters, Senator Byron Dorgan (D-ND) expressed concern that DOT planned to continue the program. “The DOT response is both arrogant and wrong! The provisions included in the omnibus spending bill was clearly written and designed to put the brakes on the current pilot program,” reads the letter. “Failure to end the pilot program, I believe, will put the Department of Transportation in direct violation of federal law,” said Dorgan in the letter.

Like it or not, Mexican trucks will continue making deliveries into the United States interior despite congressional efforts to block their passage. Congress voted last year to stop funding for a cross-border trucking pilot program, however, last week, the Bush administration argued that while the congressional action bans funding for a new program it does nothing to stop the current one. “The current cross-border trucking demonstration project will continue to operate in a manner that puts safety first, with participating Mexican carriers subject to all safety standards required by the 2008 omnibus bill and the department, while giving U.S. trucking...

Bush Administration Defies New Law by Continuing Pilot Program WASHINGTON, Jan. 7 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Bush administration broke yet another law in continuing to allow long-haul trucks from Mexico to use U.S. highways, according to a letter filed Monday by the Teamsters Union in the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco. Congress passed an omnibus budget, signed into law Dec. 26, that includes a provision banning funds "to establish a cross-border motor carrier demonstration program to allow Mexico-domiciled motor carriers to operate beyond the commercial zones." The Bush administration pretends the law doesn't apply to the existing program....

A constitutional crisis is developing between Congress and the Department of Transportation over the federal government's decision to continue its project allowing Mexican trucks on U.S. roads, in defiance of new legislation. "The DOT response is both arrogant and wrong!" Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., wrote in a letter yesterday to Secretary of Transportation Mary Peters. Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration officials told the San Diego Union Tribune the cross-border Mexican truck demonstration project would continue because the program was established in September and the amendment allows programs that have already begun to continue. But Dorgan insisted a provision in the...

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration is going ahead with a controversial pilot program giving Mexican trucks greater access to U.S. highways despite a new law by Congress against it. The decision to proceed with the four-month-old program, which allows participating Mexican trucking companies to send loads throughout the United States, comes despite language in the recently signed catchall spending bill aimed at blocking it. But the Department of Transportation is taking advantage of a loophole in the new law, which prohibits the government from spending any money to "establish" the program. The government says the new rules don't apply to...

Mexico City — Farmers and activists here are planning a series of protests as NAFTA enters its final stage on New Year's Day, when the last tariffs and quotas on corn, beans, milk and sugar melt away. Opponents of the free trade agreement warn that the final lifting of trade barriers could spark even more migration from Mexico's devastated countryside and leave Mexico dependent on the United States for corn and beans, staple dishes since the age of the Aztecs. At least one peasant group has said the NAFTA expansion could spark armed rebellion in the countryside if President Felipe...

Congress has passed a bill that cuts funding for the controversial Mexican truck program, but lawmakers expect the Bush administration to keep the foreign vehicles rolling on American roads amid safety and security concerns. Joe Kasper, spokesman for Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., told WND that "without federal funding, it will be difficult to continue the program. However, we must expect that the administration will continue looking for ways to do so." The newly passed 2008 Consolidated Appropriations Act prohibits the Department of Transportation from using the funds in it "to establish a cross-border motor carrier demonstration program to allow Mexico-domiciled...

Congress has passed a bill that cuts funding for the controversial Mexican truck program, but lawmakers expect the Bush administration to keep the foreign vehicles rolling on American roads amid safety and security concerns. Joe Kasper, spokesman for Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., told WND that "without federal funding, it will be difficult to continue the program. However, we must expect that the administration will continue looking for ways to do so." The newly passed 2008 Consolidated Appropriations Act prohibits the Department of Transportation from using the funds in it "to establish a cross-border motor carrier demonstration program to allow Mexico-domiciled...

WASHINGTON – The Mexican government is considering blocking U.S. exports, such as pork and rice, should Congress cut off funding for a cross-border trucking program, as is expected to happen within days. Even if Congress ends funding for the contentious program through the catch-all spending bill that is under consideration, there is a growing expectation that the Bush administration will find a way to continue it in what some say would be an act of defiance and others say would be compliance with the law. “We anticipate that they'll find a way to keep it going,” said Leslie Miller, a...

WASHINGTON, Dec. 19 --Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa today praised Congress for banning funds for the Bush administration's reckless pilot program to let trucks from Mexico travel freely on U.S. highways. The ban was part of the omnibus spending bill that Congress passed Wednesday. The Teamsters opposed the pilot project from the start because of real concerns that trucks from Mexico aren't safe. "Congress just made driving safer in the United States by ensuring that dangerous trucks from Mexico aren't lurching along our highways like unguided missiles," Hoffa said. "We expect the Bush administration to obey the law and put...

The long list of opponents to the cross-border trucking program isn’t exclusively made up of groups and truckers in the United States. Motor carriers in Mexico are waging their own fight to shut down the program. In fact, the Mexican National Truck Drivers Federation is planning to block the border between Mexico and the United States in January 2008 if the program doesn’t come to an end. The threat to block the border was reported in the Mexican newspaper El Financiero. The union of truckers is upset with the Mexican government for allowing U.S. trucks and truckers into their country....

It's been a few weeks since our highways were opened to Mexican trucks. I'm on hwy 85 occasionally and I've been looking for Mexican plates. Haven't seen any. Anyone out there, closer to the border roads, noticing traffic? Do Mexican trucks have to have identifying plates, or are the plates changed after they cross the border?

FMCSA's website lists 10 Mexican carriers with a total of 55 trucks that are approved to transport goods throughout the U.S. The FMCSA was asked to comment but did not reply to phone calls or e-mails. About 40 more Mexican carriers will soon join the 10 already approved. The agency, according to its website, said it "has notified an additional 37 Mexico-domiciled motor carriers that they have successfully passed a Pre-Authorization Safety Audit." The FMCSA says there are four U.S. carriers participating in the cross-border program. Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., continues to show frustration with the Bush administration. His spokesman,...

WASHINGTON — The president can't do it, nor the Supreme Court. Only the Congress has the power to levy taxes and spend public money, perhaps the most basic task of governance. Legislators, however, return this week from their Thanksgiving recess having put into law just one out of the 12 giant spending bills that make up the 2008 federal budget. Congress breaks again, this time for the year, in just two more weeks. "That's not really a lot of time to squeeze in nearly a year's worth of unfinished business," President Bush said Monday. "The end of 2007 is approaching...

Members of the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association say they have documented hundreds of safety violations by Mexican trucks rolling on U.S. roads under the Department of Transportation's Mexican truck demonstration project. "The Department of Transportation is allowing Mexican long-haul rigs to operate in the United States without requiring U.S. rules and regulations to be enforced," Rick Craig, the director of regulatory affairs for the group, told WND in a telephone interview yesterday. "The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration is providing exemptions from U.S. safety rules that the FMCSA claim are covered in a Memorandum of Understanding between the United States...

SAN DIEGO – Saying he was here to fight for the safety of America's roads, Teamsters union General President Jim Hoffa led a rally Wednesday morning at the Otay Mesa border crossing to protest a pilot program that allows long-haul trucking across the U.S.-Mexico border. “The big money boys want to have trucks coming through here that are dangerous,” Hoffa said over cheers from dozens of Teamsters and the roar from Mexican trucks leaving the U.S. inspection station on Enrico Fermi Drive. “Wake up America, fight back,” Hoffa told supporters. The pilot project, which has been up and running since...

Mexican trucks crossing into the U.S. as part of a controversial pilot project will monitored by GPS satellite technology beginning this month. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) announced the plan to track the trucks as they pick up and deliver their loads. The decision to require the installation of satellite tracking -- to be provided by Qualcomm -- was made after members of Congress expressed a desire to know whether Mexican participants in the demonstration program are complying with U.S. federal safety and trade laws. FMCSA says it will initially spend approximately $367,000 to outfit all trucks from...

It’s been 15 years coming, but a trickle of trucks has begun hauling shipments from both sides of the U.S.-Mexican border. A pilot program — called a “demonstration” — began in September, when a select few Mexican and U.S. trucking companies were allowed to haul loads between countries. More carriers will be added as they are approved, up to a maximum of 100 companies for each country. The Web site of the Federal Motor Carriers Safety Association — [snip] — this week showed that five Mexican companies with a total of 15 trucks and three U.S. companies with a total...

This past month, the Bush Administration opened the U.S. border to trucks from Mexico. Trying to soften the blow, they called it a "pilot program" but it clearly sacrifices the economic security of American workers and the safety and health of the U.S. public on George Bush's altar of free trade. There is no better example of how big money has corrupted government decision making than cross border trucking. This scheme is opposed by the Teamsters and the entire labor movement, opposed by environmental groups and the Sierra Club, opposed by Public Citizen and a host of other non-governmental organizations,...

Trucker Ricardo Cibrian was in a jam. He had just collided into the rear end of a semi-truck in front of him and was immediately hit from behind by another vehicle. He could see that the truck he hit had struck another and that they were both on fire. Cibrian called a friend from his cellphone to report the accident and to say he was trapped in his truck. The friend told him to try to break the window. As the friend listened, he heard an explosion and the line went dead. The phone call was described by Espree Campos,...

The Truckers were super supportive, honking their horns and waving. They are very opposed to the Mexican Trucks, for reasons of safety and was suppression. The border is a picket line and the illegals are scabs!

If the fact of Mexican truck drivers taking jobs away from Americans were not so deadly serious, we would laugh out loud at this hilarious rendition of how very sobering this situation is. Check it out and then contact your government reps to let them know how you feel! Click On Screen

Teamsters boss: Mexican trucks part of 'master plan' for 'super-government' Saying he is convinced "the Bush administration has a master plan to erase all borders and to have a super-government in North America," James P. Hoffa, general president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, celebrated the Senate's 75-23 vote Tuesday night to block the Department of Transportation's Mexican truck demonstration project. In an exclusive interview with WND, Hoffa argued that the Bush administration push to allow Mexican trucks into the U.S. is symptomatic of a larger administration plan advanced by multi-national corporations to create a European Union-style regional 'super-government' in...

MEXICO CITY – U.S. truckers aren't the only ones upset with a cross-border pilot program allowing long-haul Mexican tractor-trailers into the United States. Truckers south of the border aren't thrilled with it either. The private organization representing the majority of Mexico's freight haulers on Thursday demanded the government suspend the program, saying it leaves Mexican truckers at a competitive disadvantage with their U.S. counterparts. Until last week, Mexican trucks were restricted to a narrow commercial zone along the border. But after a more than decade-long dispute over the NAFTA provision opening up the roadways far across the border, the pilot...

MEXICO CITY — The private organization representing the majority of the country's freight haulers today demanded the government suspend a pilot cross-border trucking program because they said Mexican truckers are at a competitive disadvantage with their U.S. counterparts. Tirso Martinez, president of the group known by its Spanish acronym Canacar, said the one-year pilot program, which went into effect last week, is destined to fail because Mexico's Transportation Department has failed to resolve traffic bottlenecks for Mexican trucks trying to cross the U.S. border, and does not have the personnel to enforce a provision prohibiting U.S. truckers from carrying domestic...

With a veto-proof majority, no less! The AP says the House passed a similar bill in July but I can’t find the roll for that one. The Senate has long been the squishier of the two when it comes to Mexico, though, so I’ll assume the House margin was veto-proof too. (Update: It was. See below.) Here’s the Senate roll. You may be surprised, although you shouldn’t be. Update: Noam Askew emails to say that the House vote to ban the trucks was 362-63. Bush is staring down the barrel of an embarrassing veto override. Update: A fair point by...

The U.S. Senate has dealt a likely death blow to the Bush administration plans to give Mexican long-haul trucking rigs free access to United States roads and highways. A bi-partisan majority voted 74-24 tonight to pass an amendment offered by Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., to remove funding from the Fiscal Year 2008 Department of Transportation appropriations bill for the Department of Transportation Mexican trucking demonstration project. Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Penn., joined Dorgan as a co-sponsor of his amendment. "Tonight, commerce – for a change – did not trump safety," Dorgan said in a news release issued after the vote.

WASHINGTON - The Senate voted Tuesday to ban Mexican trucks from U.S. roadways, rekindling a more than decade-old trade dispute with Mexico. By a 74-24 vote, the Senate approved a proposal by Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., prohibiting the Transportation Department from spending money on a North American Free Trade Agreement pilot program giving Mexican trucks access to U.S. highways. The proposal is part of a $106 billion transportation and housing spending bill that the Senate hopes to vote on later this week. The House approved a similar provision to Dorgan's in July as part of its version of the transportation...

Another NAFTA nail is about to be hammered into the coffin Washington is building for the US economy. Within the next few days our borders will be opened to the Mexican trucking industry in an unprecedented way. A "pilot" program is starting which will allow trucks from Mexico to haul goods beyond the 25 mile buffer zone to any point in the United States . Officials claim this is being done with utmost oversight, but Americans still have their legitimate concerns. Rather than securing our borders, we seem to be providing more pores for illegal aliens, drug dealers, and terrorists...

PIEDRAS NEGRAS, Mexico - A dynamite-laden truck exploded after colliding with another vehicle on a busy highway in northern Mexico's coal country, killing at least 34 people, including three reporters at the scene, state and federal officials said. Authorities said the two vehicles crashed into each other Sunday evening, drawing a crowd of curious onlookers as well as a small army of police, soldiers, emergency officials and journalists. Shortly after the crowd arrived, the wreckage caught fire, and the dynamite exploded, sending a ball of fire into the sky that consumed nearby cars and left a 10-by-40 foot crater in...

MEXICO CITY - Two Mexican tractor-trailers have delivered payloads in New York and South Carolina, becoming the first trucks to operate deep in the United States under a long-delayed, NAFTA-mandated program criticized on both sides of the border. The trucks, operated by Transportes Olympic, a company based outside the northern Mexican city of Monterrey, crossed into the United States carrying steel construction materials and will haul similar products from Arkansas and Alabama back across the border, Mexican Transportation Secretary Luis Tellez said Sunday. Since 1982, Mexican trucks have been allowed to operate in the United States only within a 25-mile...

Mexican truckers are expected to begin transporting goods throughout the United States in coming days, after a decision Thursday night by the Transportation Department that provisionally lifted restrictions confining them to the border region. A California Highway Patrol inspector in San Diego examined a truck entering the United States from Mexico on Thursday, the day border restrictions were lifted. The provision opening the United States to Mexican long-haul trucking was called for under the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement, but it was delayed by resistance from some trucking and environmental groups. Under a one-year pilot program, as many as...

WASHINGTON — The Bush administration's late-night decision allowing Mexican trucks to ply U.S. roads triggered angry criticism Friday from opponents of the trucking program. John Hill, head of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, gave the go-ahead for the trucks late Thursday night, allowing Transportes Olympic of Nuevo Leon, Mexico, to drive its trucks beyond the roughly 25-mile limit from the border where they have been confined. In return, Mexico granted permission to Stagecoach Cartage in El Paso to operate in Mexico. Neither company had crossed the border yet, and Hill said the trucks might begin crossing this weekend. The...

Mexican trucks are rolling over the U.S. border, freely bound for anywhere in America, and it seems that nothing -- not furious Teamsters nor angry environmentalists, not even Congress -- can stop them. Are the drivers properly licensed and sober or well-rested with the legal amount of down time? Do they speak English or understand U.S. road signs? Will the trucks be carrying illegal immigrants, drugs, terrorists, nuclear or biological weapons or other contraband? Will they belch tons of banned pollutants into America’s air? Will lower-paid Mexican drivers put American truckers out of work? Will the trucks gut the tax...

SAN FRANCISCO - The Bush administration can go ahead with a pilot program to allow as many as 100 Mexican trucking companies to freely haul their cargo anywhere within the U.S. for the next year, a federal appeals court ruled Friday. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied a request made by the Teamsters union, the Sierra Club and the nonprofit Public Citizen to halt the program. The appeals court ruled the groups have not satisfied the legal requirements to immediately stop what the government is calling a "demonstration project," but can continue to argue their case. The trucking...

President Bush ordered the opening of all U.S. roads to Mexican trucks in 2002, but the dispute has been tied up in courts. The long fight, begun during the Clinton administration, had ground down to a last quarrel over an environmental assessment, or study, called an EA. Opponents of the truck expansion argued that a particular kind of study was required by law and that the Bush administration was ducking that requirement.

WASHINGTON - The Teamsters Union said Wednesday it will ask a federal appeals courts to block the Bush administration's plan to begin allowing Mexican trucks to carry cargo anywhere in the United States. The union said it has been told by officials in the Transportation Department's Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration that the first Mexican trucks will be coming across the border on Saturday.

Texas Governor Rick Perry is being called to task by an author and investigative journalist for vetoing bills that would have blocked construction of the controversial Trans-Texas Corridor. Dr. Jerome Corsi has been one of the leading voices warning the American public about the consequences of the Trans-Texas Corridor, which will be part of a superhighway -- purported to be four football fields wide -- that will allow Mexican trucks to enter the U.S. and traverse the core of the country all the way to Canada. The best-selling author asserts that Governor Perry cleared the way for construction to begin...

WASHINGTON: Some Mexican trucks will be allowed to carry cargo anywhere in the United States as soon as a U.S. inspector general certifies safety and inspection plans, the administration of President George W. Bush announced Friday. The latest step toward implementing a controversial provision of the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement drew instant condemnation from labor and driver-owner groups that fear the program will erode highway safety and eliminate U.S. jobs. The decision was announced by a Transportation Department notice in the Federal Register, a daily compendium of new federal rules read mostly by lobbyists and lawyers. A one-year...

WASHINGTON – A federal transportation agency yesterday defended President Bush's plan to open the border to long-haul Mexican truck traffic in a response to overwhelmingly negative public views of the proposal. The 27-page defense appearing in the Federal Register advances the controversial cross-border trucking pilot program one step closer to implementation. Online: To read the full government report, click on: http://www.access.gpo.gov/ su_docs/fedreg/ a070817c.html Scroll down to Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration and click on link to "NAFTA cross-border trucking provisions." Bush has sought to conduct the program as part of his effort to comply with a provision of the North...

Hoffa Says Bush Administration Needs To Get It Right (WASHINGTON, D.C.) _ The Teamsters Union strongly endorses the House of Representatives’ move today to block the Bush administration’s cross-border trucking program. The House voted by voice vote to amend the Transportation-HUD 2008 appropriations bill by limiting funding for the pilot project. The amendment had bipartisan support, with sponsorship by Reps. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., Nancy Boyda, D-Kan., Gary Miller, R-Calif., and Duncan Hunter, R-Calif. “The Transportation Department needs to get it right before throwing open our borders to Mexican trucks,” Hoffa said. “The Bush administration has been too eager to endanger...