The American Trucking Associations is searching for a new president and CEO. GreenLatinos, alongside more than a dozen other organizations, just sent ATA's Board a clear message about what that choice should look like: pick a leader ready to move the industry forward, not one hired to keep it stuck in the past.
ATA has spent recent years fighting the wrong fights. It celebrated the Senate's attempt to kill California's Advanced Clean Trucks framework as a "monumental victory," even though that framework would have accelerated EV adoption, cut fuel costs, and reduced diesel exposure for drivers themselves. More recently, ATA has pushed EPA to delay and weaken the 2027 heavy-duty NOx rule and expand emissions-credit trading, essentially lobbying to keep dirtier trucks on the road longer.
Here's the part that should sting: Diesel pollution is a Class 1 carcinogen. Truck drivers (the very people ATA claims to represent!!) are among the workers most heavily exposed to it, spending their long hours on the road breathing diesel exhaust in and around the truck cab.
Fighting against cleaner-truck standards isn't a neutral business position. It's a choice to keep drivers sicker. Drivers deserve better. So do the pollution burdened communities devastated by the impacts of truck pollution. There’s a reason they’re called Diesel Death Zones.
Just last week, ATA “celebrated” National Truck Driver Appreciation Week, thanking drivers for keeping the country moving. That appreciation rings hollow if the organization is simultaneously lobbying against the policies that would make their jobs less hazardous.
We're calling on ATA's Board to select a president who treats electrification and cleaner technology as competitive necessities, not threats to the industry’s future.
ATA needs someone who understands that the future of trucking is cleaner and increasingly electric, and who's prepared to lead the industry there instead of standing in the way.
Read our full letter here.
