Operation Safe Driver Week 2026: what officers wrote up

Operation Safe Driver Week 2026 ran July 12-18, with law enforcement agencies from 36 U.S. states, seven Canadian provinces, and Mexico taking part. Officers watched both truck and car drivers, pulled over the ones driving unsafely, and issued a warning or a citation.

The 2026 focus was reckless, careless, or dangerous driving, the third year in a row CVSA has centered the week on reckless or careless driving. CVSA defines reckless driving as driving in willful or wanton disregard for the safety of persons or property, and careless or dangerous driving as driving without due care and attention or reasonable consideration for others.

When is Operation Safe Driver Week 2027?

As of October 20, 2026, CVSA had not announced the 2027 dates; its Operation Safe Driver Week page says they will be posted at the end of this year. The week has fallen in mid-July three years running: July 7-13, 2024; July 13-19, 2025; and July 12-18, 2026.

Speeding and ignored traffic signals and signs led, followed by seat belts and phones. The table shows the warnings and citations CVSA reported for commercial drivers in each category, next to the same category in 2025.

Speeding alone was about one in five actions against commercial drivers, and speeding plus traffic control devices was nearly two in five. Our guide to a speeding ticket in a commercial vehicle covers what a speeding conviction does to a CDL.

Check whether the week touched your own record, then put your effort where the citations landed. The full prevention routine is in our guide to Operation Safe Driver; these are the priorities the 2026 numbers point to.

Find any July stops in your own data

FMCSA counts violations recorded on a roadside inspection report in its Safety Measurement System whether the officer wrote a citation or only a warning. A state citation without an inspection report is not used. Ask drivers for anything an officer handed them that week and match it to your inspection history.

Under the SMS methodology, a violation counts triple for its first six months, double for the next six, and at face value until it drops out after 24 months. For a stop on July 12-18, 2026, that means triple weight through mid-January 2027 and nothing after mid-July 2028. If a violation was recorded in error, request a review through DataQs. Our guide to unsafe driving violations and CSA scores explains the full calculation.

Make seat belts and phones a written company rule

These are the two categories where officers wrote more citations than warnings, and they carry heavy weights in SMS: 7 for a seat belt violation and 10 for texting or hand-held phone use, on a scale of 1 to 10. The rules also bind the carrier: under 49 CFR 392.16, 392.80, and 392.82, a motor carrier may not require or permit unbelted driving, texting, or hand-held phone use while driving.

Put both in the driver policy, have every driver sign it, and give drivers a hands-free setup so dispatch never needs a hand on the phone.

Train on signals and speed before the 2027 week

Traffic control devices and speeding produced 2,085 of the 5,365 actions against commercial drivers. Build them into your regular driver safety training now, rather than in a briefing the week before the 2027 dates are announced, and use our blitz week preparation guide to plan around the other CVSA campaigns.