Since 2025, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has begun withdrawing visas from trucking operators designated as B1 , meaning they can provide service between cities in Mexico and the United States, but cannot provide services between two points within the United States.
The above, which is called cabotage, is the main excuse of the ICE officers to withdraw the B1 visas of the operators , and for this reason, on September 3, various operators in an organized manner generated this demonstration to seek to stop the withdrawal of visas.
According to information provided to T21, between April 2025 and April 2026 the United States has withdrawn more than 25,000 visas from trucking operators, of which about 4,000 were withdrawn in the Baja California area at the border crossings of Tijuana, Mexicali and San Luis.
Through various social media pages, there are testimonies from a person who defines himself as Tiktrokero Mx, where it is confirmed that since the morning of September 3, the Nuevo Mexicali border crossing (customs) was blocked due to the mass withdrawal of visas to Mexican operators.
“The withdrawal will continue until the authorities give us a response, and if there is no reaction, we will move to the Tijuana area to seek answers from the authorities. This is a demonstration by operators; it has nothing to do with representatives or groups like Canacar,” commented the spokesperson for the demonstration.
Based on what the operators themselves explained, on Tuesday, September 1st alone, 17 visas were withdrawn in the Mexicali area, while on Wednesday, September 2nd, seven more visas were removed.
“The operators no longer want to cross for fear that their visas could be revoked without any justification. On one occasion, they told us that their visas were revoked for having a four-day trip; some trips take us up to nine days, without even doing coastal shipping,” added Conrado Marrón, an operator for Transportes Luna.
“It’s not enough to have all the operations legal; even then, they’re taking away visas from operators. The United States has gone from being the land of opportunity to the land of repression,” commented Conrado Marrón, an operator for Transportes Luna, during a Facebook Live broadcast.
According to data from the U.S. Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS), Laredo accounts for 38% of all two-way commercial crossings with Mexico, followed by Tijuana with 13% of the total, while Mexicali contributes about 5% of the operations.
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