A Fatal Bus Crash, a Cabinet Secretary's Talking Point, and a Policy Fight Years in the Making

At 2:35 a.m. on Friday, May 29, a southbound bus on Interstate 95 in Stafford County, Virginia, failed to slow for traffic backed up near a work zone and plowed into six vehicles [1]. Five people died: a 25-year-old woman from Worcester, Massachusetts, and a family of four from Greenfield, Massachusetts — a 45-year-old man, a 44-year-old woman, a 13-year-old girl, and a 7-year-old boy — who burned to death when their Acura caught fire on impact [2]. Forty-four others were taken to hospitals, three in critical condition [3].

Before the National Transportation Safety Board had dispatched its go-team — before investigators had examined the bus's event data recorder, the work zone's signage configuration, or the driver's fatigue history — Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy had already identified the cause that mattered to him. The driver, 48-year-old Jing Dong of Staten Island, "doesn't speak English," Duffy wrote on social media Friday evening [4]. "This is exactly why we are holding states' accountable, enforcing the rules of the road, and cracking down on drivers who can't speak English."

The statement placed a five-fatality crash squarely in the center of a policy campaign the Trump administration had been waging for over a year. Whether that framing is supported by the evidence remains, as of this writing, entirely unknown.

What the Investigation Has — and Hasn't — Found

Virginia State Police identified the crash as a rear-end collision in a work zone: the bus, operated by E&P Travel Inc. of Kings Mountain, North Carolina, struck vehicles that had slowed or stopped ahead of an active construction area [5]. The preliminary investigation has not attributed the crash to a language barrier. Standard variables in a work-zone rear-end collision — vehicle speed, driver fatigue or distraction, road geometry, signage visibility, weather, and mechanical condition — have not been publicly ruled in or ruled out [6].

The NTSB confirmed Friday that it would conduct a full investigation, a process that typically takes 12 to 24 months [3]. No preliminary report has been issued.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration's own records for E&P Travel show a "satisfactory" safety rating, with one prior injury accident in the preceding two years. But the company also had four violations on file: three for drivers allegedly exceeding the speed limit by 15 mph or more, and one for a driver who could not satisfy English proficiency requirements [7]. Whether that prior ELP violation involved Dong or a different driver has not been disclosed.

Dong received his commercial driver's license from New York State in 2024 [4]. Charges are pending. The Department of Transportation has said it is reviewing his licensing records and training documentation [8].

The Regulation: 49 CFR 391.11(b)(2)

Federal law has required commercial motor vehicle drivers to "read and speak the English language sufficiently to converse with the general public, to understand highway traffic signs and signals in the English language, to respond to official inquiries, and to make entries on reports and records" since the provision was first codified decades ago [9]. The requirement is not new. What has changed, repeatedly, is how seriously the government enforces it.

From 2005 through 2015, English Language Proficiency violations were included in the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance's out-of-service criteria, meaning a driver found non-compliant during a roadside inspection could be removed from the road immediately [10]. In 2016, under the Obama administration, FMCSA issued guidance directing inspectors not to place drivers out of service solely for ELP violations — a driver would receive a citation or warning, but could continue driving [11]. The specific rationale the Obama administration offered for the policy change is not well-documented in the public record.

Then, on April 28, 2025, President Trump signed Executive Order 14286, "Enforcing Commonsense Rules of the Road for America's Truck Drivers," directing FMCSA to rescind the 2016 guidance and reinstate out-of-service enforcement [12]. Secretary Duffy implemented the order with new inspection procedures effective June 25, 2025 [13]. The Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance voted to add ELP non-compliance back to its out-of-service criteria on the same date [10].

The enforcement shift was dramatic.

Source: FMCSA / CVSA enforcement data

Data as of May 30, 2026CSV

In all of 2023 and 2024 combined, just 14 drivers were placed out of service for ELP violations nationwide. In the second half of 2025 alone, that number rose to 12,308 [14]. Total ELP violations — including citations that did not result in an out-of-service order — reached 48,213 in 2025 [14]. By early 2026, Congress codified the change into federal law, making ELP failure an automatic out-of-service trigger [15].

Who Is Being Pulled Off the Road — and Where

The enforcement wave has not been evenly distributed.

Source: FMCSA enforcement data

Data as of May 30, 2026CSV

Texas accounted for 57.2 percent of all ELP violations in 2025, with California, Florida, and New York together adding another 11.2 percent [14]. The geographic concentration reflects the demographic reality of the commercial driving workforce: roughly 3.8 percent of the nation's approximately 3.5 million CDL holders — around 130,000 to 140,000 drivers — are estimated to have limited English proficiency [16]. Foreign-born drivers account for nearly one in six U.S. truck drivers overall, with particularly high concentrations in the Sikh, Chinese, Hispanic, and Haitian communities [17].

The American Trucking Associations had estimated a driver shortage of 60,000 to 80,000 in 2025, with projections reaching 115,000 by year's end [17]. More than 6,000 drivers with clean safety records have had their commercial licenses suspended or revoked since the enforcement push began [18].

The Safety Data: Correlation, Not Causation

A study by Fusable's MC Advantage found that motor carriers with ELP violations on their records were involved in DOT-recordable crashes at nearly double the national average rate — a risk factor that exceeded those linked to speeding or drug violations [19]. That finding has been widely cited by enforcement proponents, including by Secretary Duffy's Department of Transportation.

The study's own authors, however, were careful to note a distinction: the data shows correlation, not causation [19]. Carriers with ELP violations may also have broader compliance failures — inadequate training, poor vehicle maintenance, lax scheduling — that independently contribute to higher crash rates. Whether a driver's inability to read English road signs caused any specific crash, as opposed to a carrier's general disregard for federal regulations, is a question the aggregate data cannot answer.

No peer-reviewed study has isolated English proficiency as an independent variable in commercial vehicle crash rates while controlling for other factors. The FMCSA does not publish crash data segmented by driver language proficiency in a way that permits such analysis.

The Civil Rights Dimension

Strict enforcement has prompted legal challenges. In December 2025, the Sikh Coalition, the Asian Law Caucus, and Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP filed a class-action lawsuit on behalf of California commercial drivers — including DACA recipients, Temporary Protected Status holders, and asylum seekers — arguing that the enforcement campaign disproportionately targets immigrant drivers who had met all federal and state licensing requirements [20].

California delayed the revocation of approximately 17,000 commercial driver's licenses to allow more time for drivers who legally qualify to retain them [20]. The Department of Transportation withheld $40 million in federal highway safety funding from California, accusing the state of failing to enforce ELP requirements [20].

The legal landscape is complicated by a separate executive action: on April 23, 2025, five days before the trucking executive order, President Trump directed federal agencies to eliminate the use of disparate-impact liability "to the maximum degree possible" [21]. Disparate-impact claims — which challenge policies that are facially neutral but disproportionately burden a protected class — are the primary legal theory available to drivers challenging ELP enforcement. The administration has simultaneously tightened the rule and weakened the legal framework for challenging it.

How Other Countries Handle It

The United States is not the only country with a large multilingual commercial driving workforce, but it takes a harder-line approach than most peers.

Canada does not impose a federal English proficiency requirement for commercial drivers. Licensing is administered provincially: Ontario and British Columbia offer CDL knowledge tests in multiple languages, while Quebec mandates French proficiency. Road signs in most provinces are in English, but no driver is placed out of service for language ability alone [22]. Canadian commercial vehicle fatality rates per vehicle-mile-traveled are broadly comparable to U.S. rates, though differences in road networks, climate, and reporting standards make direct comparison imprecise.

European Union member states require that drivers hold a Certificate of Professional Competence, which includes a theory test administered in the licensing country's language. A Polish driver working in Germany, however, is not required to pass a German-language proficiency test — mutual recognition of licenses across member states means language ability is not a standalone enforcement criterion [22].

Australia administers CDL equivalents through its states and territories, with knowledge tests available in English only in most jurisdictions, but does not conduct roadside language proficiency assessments of the type the FMCSA now mandates [22]. Data on whether these frameworks produce better or worse safety outcomes relative to the U.S. is limited and confounded by differences in vehicle fleets, road conditions, and regulatory structures.

The Industry's Divided Response

The trucking industry is not of one mind.

The American Trucking Associations endorsed the enforcement push, saying it "aligns with ATA's longstanding priority to keep roads safe by enhancing training, testing and licensing standards" [17]. The Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association has supported the policy on similar grounds.

Carriers that rely heavily on immigrant labor, however, are scrambling. Many have boosted pay or added hiring bonuses for English-proficient drivers; in states like Washington, New York, and Illinois, average truck driver salaries already exceed $65,000 and are climbing in areas with high enforcement pressure [18]. Smaller carriers, particularly those serving agricultural and construction supply chains, report difficulty finding replacement drivers.

Transportation safety advocates have offered a more nuanced position. Several groups have argued that the enforcement mechanism — roadside proficiency assessments conducted by individual inspectors with no standardized testing protocol — introduces subjectivity and inconsistency. The FMCSA's two-step assessment process asks inspectors to evaluate whether a driver can communicate during the inspection and then, if concerns arise, to conduct a more detailed assessment [23]. Critics say this gives individual inspectors broad discretion and creates opportunities for profiling.

The Political Framing Question

Secretary Duffy's response to the Virginia crash fits a pattern. Since taking office, Duffy has made ELP enforcement a signature initiative, framing it as both a safety measure and a corrective to what he calls a "dangerous Obama-era policy" [13]. His public statements consistently link language proficiency to road safety in direct, causal terms: "If you can't be properly trained, read our road signs, or communicate with law enforcement, you have no business driving a bus" [4].

The timeline matters. The executive order mandating ELP enforcement was signed on April 28, 2025 — a full year before the Virginia crash. The CVSA out-of-service criteria took effect June 25, 2025. Congress codified the requirement in early 2026. The policy apparatus was already built and running when the Stafford County crash occurred.

Duffy's statement on the crash came within hours, before any investigative body had identified language as a contributing factor. The crash occurred in a work zone at 2:35 a.m. — conditions in which fatigue, speed, and visibility are standard variables in rear-end collisions. Whether Dong's inability to speak English contributed to his failure to slow for stopped traffic is a question the investigation has not yet addressed, and one that a language deficiency does not self-evidently answer: highway work zone signs in Virginia use universal symbols, flashing lights, and orange cones that do not require English literacy to interpret.

The administration's critics argue that raising the language issue before the investigation has established facts is the definition of using a tragedy to validate a pre-existing agenda. The administration's defenders counter that the crash illustrates precisely why the policy was needed — a driver who cannot read English obtained a CDL from New York State and was operating a passenger bus on a federal interstate, and that systemic failure warrants scrutiny regardless of whether language was the proximate cause of this specific collision.

Both arguments contain elements that are difficult to dismiss.

What Comes Next

The NTSB investigation will take months, possibly years. Criminal charges against Dong are pending in Virginia. The Department of Transportation has opened an inquiry into New York's CDL licensing procedures. E&P Travel faces scrutiny over its hiring and training practices.

The broader policy debate, meanwhile, is accelerating. Congress codified ELP out-of-service enforcement in early 2026 [15]. The California class-action lawsuit is working through the courts. The driver shortage, already acute, is projected to worsen as enforcement continues to remove drivers from the workforce faster than new, English-proficient drivers can be trained and licensed.

The Virginia crash killed five people. The question of why it happened — speed, fatigue, distraction, mechanical failure, language, or some combination — remains unanswered. The question of what policy conclusions should be drawn from it is already being answered, loudly, by officials who have not waited for the evidence.