A trade group is suing to strip California and New York of the power to issue commercial driver's licenses entirely. Plus: $3/mi is now breakeven, DOT wants to rate every carrier, routing guides are falling apart, and more.
Shippers want the same things they’ve always wanted: reliable execution, fair pricing, and a partner who shows up prepared.
"We're basically in the center of the United States. As middle as you can get. Every class one railroad comes through Kansas City. It makes it very unique."
DOT Blitz Week starts tomorrow, and brokers are bracing for one of the toughest weeks in years. Plus: $10.1M in stolen freight leads to five years in prison, Forward Air loses 40% of its value, diesel prices hit produce costs, and more.
Happy Monday. DOT Blitz Week starts tomorrow, and it may be one of the most challenging weeks for freight brokers in years. We break down why in today’s feature.
Plus:
🚨 Five Years for $10.1M in Stolen Freight. An Elk Grove Village, Illinois, man was sentenced this week to 60 months in federal prison for spending three years impersonating carriers and brokers to steal more than $10.1 million in interstate shipments. Aivaras Zigmantas, 41, used aliases from 2020 to 2023 to fraudulently book loads of liquor and commercial copper, then diverted them before delivery. He and associates intended to steal $14.6M total. The case was prosecuted through the DOJ's Trade Fraud Task Force. The scheme ran for three years across real and fictitious company names before federal investigators caught up with it.
📉 Forward Air Loses 40% of Its Market Cap in a Day. Forward Air's stock dropped more than 40% Friday after the company disclosed that one of its largest customers plans to transition roughly $250M in annual revenue to other providers beginning in 2027. That's about 10% of Forward's total revenue walking out the door, and the announcement came on top of a Q1 loss of $40.2M on revenue of $582M, which missed estimates by 6%. A strategic review that had explored selling the entire company produced zero actionable offers. Forward now plans to sell its intermodal segment and two legacy Omni units. CEO Shawn Stewart attributed the customer loss to their own internal diversification strategy and said it had nothing to do with service. The stock went from $17 to roughly $10 in a single session.
🥬 Diesel Is Eating the Produce Aisle. At New York's Hunts Point Market (the largest food distribution center in the country), vendors are watching margins collapse in real time. Trucking celery 3,000 miles from California now costs $11,000, up 46% from last year, and that extra cost is showing up as 40 cents more on a sleeve of celery at the corner store. Asparagus from Peru that sold for $32 per 11 pounds last May is now going for around $60. Tomatoes were already 22% more expensive year over year in March, before the Hormuz closure added another energy shock. One sweet corn grower watched his freight cost per shipment jump from $4,000 to $6,600. Produce shippers are getting squeezed from every direction and will push back on rates they can no longer afford.
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The trucking industry’s biggest annual enforcement push is here. CVSA International Roadcheck (often called DOT Blitz Week) runs May 12-14, 2026, across the U.S., Canada, and Mexico.
Inspectors will conduct Level I roadside checks at weigh stations, pop-up sites, and highways, reviewing driver logs, hours-of-service (HOS), vehicle condition, and cargo.
In 2025, roughly one in five vehicles inspected during Roadcheck was placed out of service. That's the answer to today's QOTD: 20%. One in five.
In a market where spot rates just hit a cycle high and capacity has been tightening for months, 20% means a meaningful chunk of available trucks get sidelined mid-week.
This year's focus areas: ELD tampering and cargo securement.
ELD-related violations remain a top problem.
If inspectors can’t determine actual drive and rest times due to tampering (like fictitious accounts, ghost logs, or edited data), drivers face an automatic 10-hour OOS order. Willful violations can bring fines up to $16,000. FMCSA enforcement is up 28% this year.
Contrast with Last Year: In 2025, the focus was on tire safety for vehicles and, more broadly, on false records of duty status for drivers. This year’s sharper targeting of ELD tampering reflects its growing severity.
Improper tie-downs, straps, or dunnage create road hazards. Inspectors placed thousands of vehicles OOS for these issues in 2025.
Roadcheck runs from Tuesday midnight to Thursday midnight.
Between ELD tampering as the specific focus, capacity already shrinking each day, and spot rates at a cycle high with capacity already tight, this may be the most disruptive Roadcheck in years. Brokers, carriers, get ready.
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🎭 $170 to Fake a Team Driver. An app called TruckHelp, advertised in Russian on a Facebook group, offers to send someone to check in at a shipper on behalf of a solo driver for $170 per visit.
📈 Spot Rates Hit Cycle High. The 7-day national truckload spot rate index just hit $3.11/mile, up 26% year over year, with LTL new bids running 12.5% higher, the strongest upward pressure in that sector since Yellow shut down in 2023.
⛽️ Hormuz Dark Since May 5. Transits through the Strait of Hormuz have been halted since May 5 amid escalating U.S.-Iran military tensions, with major port constraints in the UAE and Oman limiting cargo evacuation.
🚛 Virginia Blitz: 62% of Trucks OOS. Citizen complaints triggered a commercial vehicle inspection sweep in Virginia that placed 62% of inspected trucks out of service.
🌉 $46k Towing Bill, One Phone Call. A Chicago trucking company got its bridge-struck truck back for $5,000 after calling WGN News, which showed up at the tow yard and made Official Towing scatter "like bugs."
🤖 FMCSA May Clear Driverless Fleets. The agency is weighing an exemption that could allow significantly larger autonomous truck deployments on U.S. highways.
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A trade group is suing to strip California and New York of the power to issue commercial driver's licenses entirely. Plus: $3/mi is now breakeven, DOT wants to rate every carrier, routing guides are falling apart, and more.
"We're basically in the center of the United States. As middle as you can get. Every class one railroad comes through Kansas City. It makes it very unique."
S&P is cautiously optimistic about the freight recovery, but it still kept RXO's rating below investment grade. Plus: the Strait is set to reopen, Volvo pulls the safety driver, the U.S. goes after cheap trailers, and more.
The World Cup kicked off, and Amazon decided to become forklift certified. Plus: the Fed could spoil freight's party, C.H. Robinson in crosshairs again, the World Cup is a freight problem, and more.
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