Momentum is building behind the U.S. Department of Transportation’s campaign to root out sham driver training and bad-actor carriers. As outlined in recent FreightWaves reporting, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy has made targeting “CDL mills” and rogue fleets a central safety priority — a push that is now being reinforced by new calls from Capitol Hill and fresh evidence that identity-driven freight crime is escalating.
On October 28, Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas and Rep. Andy Barr of Kentucky urged Duffy to open a formal probe into CDL “mills,” warning that substandard programs are churning out minimally prepared drivers and exploiting gaps in the Entry-Level Driver Training rule. The lawmakers also previewed policy levers — including a proposal to require English-only CDL testing and to mandate specific hours of behind-the-wheel instruction — that would tighten standards well beyond today’s baseline. Their letter signals that Congress is prepared to press USDOT for additional rulemaking even as the agency steps up enforcement.
The fraud fight is widening at the carrier level, too. New data released October 29 show that direct cargo thefts now outpace email compromise and other schemes, with “rogue carriers” implicated in a significant share of losses. In Q3, risk platform Highway reported blocking 605,728 fraudulent emails and flagging 62,531 suspect phone numbers — and, crucially for fleets, it recorded 149 unauthorized FMCSA contact changes, a red flag for account takeovers and identity manipulation. For operators and brokers, the takeaway is that paperwork tampering and record hijacking are no longer edge cases — they’re mainstream tactics that demand stronger verification from tender to settlement.
Why it matters to trucking: If USDOT couples its training crackdown with a parallel push on carrier identity integrity, the compliance bar will rise on two fronts at once — who gets licensed and who is allowed to operate. For safety-first fleets, that could level the playing field by squeezing out shops that undercut rates with improperly trained drivers or falsified credentials. For everyone else, the cost of weak vetting just went up: a bad training partner or a compromised carrier profile can now create regulatory exposure, civil liability and direct cash losses.
Policy signals to watch in the near term: Congress’ English-only testing bill and potential minimum behind-the-wheel hour requirements would force uniformity across states and providers — changes long sought by mainstream training associations and many large fleets. USDOT does not need to wait for a new law to tighten oversight of training providers or to police fraudulent licensing activity, and the letter from Cotton and Barr explicitly presses the department to act under existing authority while legislation is pending.
What carriers and brokers can do now:
– Audit driver files for ELDT compliance and document true behind-the-wheel hours; verify that every training partner remains in good standing on the Training Provider Registry.
– Lock down identity — require multi-channel callbacks on bank and contact changes, confirm rate confirmations through secure channels, and monitor for FMCSA profile edits tied to your USDOT number.
– Stress-test language proficiency processes and road-test readiness internally before sending new drivers to third-party shippers. These steps mirror the threat patterns and controls that risk platforms say are most effective against evolving fraud.
Bottom line: The political and enforcement climate has shifted in favor of stricter gatekeeping. With lawmakers pushing USDOT to squeeze “mills” and the latest fraud index documenting how rogue operations move money and freight through identity abuse, fleets that invest now in verifiable training and airtight identity controls will be better positioned — both to avoid enforcement heat and to win freight from shippers demanding proof of compliance.
Sources: FreightWaves, Overdrive, Senator Tom Cotton press office, AJOT
This article was prepared exclusively for TruckStopInsider.com. Republishing is permitted only with proper credit and a link back to the original source.
