FMCSA says it has purged 10,000+ driver training providers and is tightening ELD and carrier registration checks

FMCSA has removed more than 10,000 driver training providers from its Training Provider Registry since December 2025, the agency's Chief Safety Officer, Steve Dowling, said Wednesday, according to FreightWaves. He spoke at the WEX OTR Summit in Jacksonville, Florida, and laid out a five-part enforcement approach covering training, licensing, registration, operations and enforcement.

The new piece is the scope. The registry cleanup is separate from the emergency action Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy announced on Aug. 31, which hit about 110 schools tied to more than 5,000 drivers cited for English-language proficiency violations. Transport Topics reported on Oct. 8 that FMCSA had closed school locations at 9,970 sites as of Oct. 5, with about 31,000 still listed as active and nearly 800 schools under review.

Registration, ELDs and chameleon carriers

Dowling said FMCSA has also removed more than 100 noncompliant electronic logging devices from its registered list and blocked nearly 600 others from approval, according to FreightWaves. He said logs should not be editable "by making a phone call."

On carrier registration, he said the new Motus system is meant to verify ownership and principal place of business before authority is granted. He said "thousands" of applicants have been kept out but gave no exact count. He also said that, based on data he reviewed the prior week, about 95% of registration activity was working, and he called the failures in the rest "not acceptable." FMCSA has temporarily suspended the biennial registration update requirement.

Dowling flagged multiple carriers sharing one address or PO box as a possible sign of hidden common ownership. He said FMCSA is working with the Justice Department, the FBI and federal prosecutors on fraud cases that span companies and states.

What it means for carriers

- Check your ELD. Confirm your provider is still on FMCSA's registered list.
- Vet driver credentials. Expect more scrutiny of where a new hire trained and how the CDL was issued, including non-domiciled licenses. Dowling said FMCSA is auditing state licensing instead of relying on a national count.
- Expect friction on new authority. Applicants, and brokers vetting new carriers, should plan for Motus delays and extra ownership checks.

What shippers and brokers should watch

Closures reduce the supply of training providers and raise vetting stakes for anyone onboarding carriers. Transport Topics noted the campaign now involves Homeland Security Investigations and a White House fraud task force, which points to more activity, not less.

Dowling also said it is too early to tell whether enforcement is lowering crashes, and that FMCSA needs more data. For 2027, he said the agency is studying possible hours-of-service changes, including sleeper-berth rules and the 14-hour window, and reviewing the Safety Measurement System.