If you read the news online, it often claims that the California port situation is caused by a driver shortage. But wait, hold your horses: it is in part caused by a driver shortage but what has driven this numbers shortfall?
In 2020, all CA trucks are required by CA CARB to be the model year 2011 or newer or to be re-powered with a 2010 or newer engine as part of an effort to improve air quality and reduce emissions. CARB adds, however, that the Truck and Bus Regulation is already in effect, and that the Board can place a DMV regulation block on any vehicles they choose now, before the final compliance dates, if they don’t meet current air quality regulations. The other problem is California Assembly Bill 5, or simply AB 5.
AB 5 prohibits owner-operators. Traditionally, the ports have been served by a large percentage of owner-operators (non-union). California has now BANNED owner-operators under the long, hazy terms of Assembly Bill 5. Why?
Many owner-operators living in California, such as those working for Landstar or Prime, have not had their contracts renewed for the new year and had to make some difficult decisions between moving out of the state or changing with whom they work. For these unfortunate people, it does not matter that the law was blocked within a month of becoming official.
Will it remain blocked under Joe Biden and his blindness to all laws affecting fellow liberals Merrick Garland? Doubtful, given how Stacy Abrams and Kamala Harris are now churning through 300 churches in Virginia openly campaigning for Terry McAwful, a clear violation of federal law which would, in any sane administration, cost the churches their 521(c)3 designations and federal sanctions against Abrams and Harris.
But, again, the recent onset of blindness to Democrat criminality has dogged Uncle Merrick from the time he swore to uphold that “scrap of paper,” our US Constitution. As for Biden, Dr. Jill has yet to tell him that he’s US President and not on a VP farewell tour.
We want to thank John Burtis for this Op-Ed. If you have an Op-Ed or LTE
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Other states, such as New Jersey, are also creating similar bills on owner-operators that may become law. Whether or not those will include any exceptions for trucking has yet to be seen. They very well could be similar to the law in California, where even if the law is blocked, logistics companies planning ahead will refuse to renew contracts for its owner-operators in the respective state knowing the foibles in DC all too well.
In the long run, truckers in California are not investing in new trucks because California has an executive fiat that makes them illegal in 2035. The requirement is to purchase electric trucks which do not exist. The Media conveniently leaves out that the problem stems from California Democrat Regulations.
This past September, arch uber-liberal California governor Gavin Newsom signed an Executive Order that, amid much fanfare, promised his patented “bold action” on the simmering “climate crisis.” It would require every new car sold in the state by 2035 to be emission free, which means a mandate for electric and hydrogen powered vehicles and, he added, trucks would go the same route by 2040. “Cars shouldn’t give our kids asthma. Make wildfires worse. Melt glaciers. Raise sea levels, or force sea otters into our yards,” the kindest liberal governor alive, tweeted.
The prices keep getting higher for truck drivers and automobile owners to do business in California. You can thank Governor Gavin Newsom and the limousine liberals who don’t know where their food and other essentials come from or how much it costs because they just churn out another BS movie when they need cash (try watching that gawd awful latest LeBron James “movie” to see what I mean.) and keep voting him into office.
When you are in empty grocery stores fighting over rationed essentials and food remember who ran the truck drivers and small owner-operator truck driving businesses out of California.
Remember, California’s inanity, in food shortages, BS laws and reckless liberal insanity always moves east. A few thousand more Kool-Aid® drinkers in the Connecticut River area who know better about our lives than we do could throw all of New Hampshire under the proverbial electric bus.
