Trump has ‘unfinished business’ regarding broker transparency

In general, a rollback of regulations is expected in Donald Trump’s second term as president. However, comments from Trump in 2020 indicate that his administration may be supportive of a rulemaking to enforce broker transparency in the trucking industry.

If you recall, truckers traveled to Washington, D.C., in May 2020 to protest against historically low freight rates and the lack of transparency in broker transactions. The protest lasted weeks, with an estimated 60 to 110 trucks participating each day.

It was enough to catch the attention of Trump, who was serving his first term. The protest prompted a meeting with Trump’s White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows as well as comments from the president.

“I’m with the TRUCKERS all the way,” Trump posted on Twitter on May 3, 2020. “Thanks for the meeting at the White House with my representatives from the Administration. It is all going to work out well!”

Less than a week later, Trump told “Fox & Friends” that truck drivers were being “price gouged.”

“They’re like the farmers,” Trump said. “All they want is to be treated fairly, and we’re going to treat them fairly. What they’re asking for is almost nothing in many cases.”

At the same time all of this was going on, the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association submitted a petition that asked the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration to enforce existing broker regulations and to close loopholes that allowed brokers to evade those rules.

FMCSA accepted the petition in 2023, then last month introduced a notice of proposed rulemaking that includes four provisions to improve broker transparency.

Specifically, the broker transparency proposal would:

• Require brokers to keep their records in an electronic format
• Require brokers to provide an electronic copy of records within 48 hours after a carrier makes a request
• Require that records contain information about charges and payments connected to the shipment, including a description, amount and dates, as well as any claims connected to the shipment
• Affirm that brokers have a regulatory obligation to provide transaction records

OOIDA is hopeful that broker transparency will still be on Trump’s radar when he returns to office in January.

“This rulemaking is unfinished business for the Trump administration,” said Collin Long, OOIDA’s director of government affairs. “They started this process back in 2020, and we hope they consider finalizing this rule and continuing to work with OOIDA to make broker transparency a top priority on Day 1.”

The public has about a month-and-a-half to comment on the notice of proposed rulemaking.

Those who would like to comment on the broker transparency proposal can click here or go to Regulations.gov and enter Docket No. FMCSA-2023-0257-0001. Comments must be received by Jan. 21, 2025.

So far, more than 800 comments have been submitted to the docket. LL