The nation’s supply troubles might have just gotten worse following the Department of Homeland Security issuing yet another COVID vaccine mandate. A new U.S. port regulation recently went into effect mandating that noncitizens may not enter the U.S. through ports of entry unless they have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19. While the new mandate does not apply to American truck drivers, it does apply to all Canadian and Mexican drivers. Furthermore, both Canada and Mexico have implemented similar rules, effectively preventing U.S. truck drivers from hauling cargo internationally if they have not been vaccinated.

Ergo, even as the latest wave of Omicron appears to be peaking and is on the downswing in many states, the Biden administration seems intent on doing everything possible to stymie America’s economic recovery. With inflation at a 40-year high (7%) and the cost of goods eating up more and more of working families’ budgets, the Biden administration is ensuring that both imported and exported goods will jump in price and decrease in availability.

Meanwhile, the dearth of drivers within the American trucking industry has gotten so bad that the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration just approved a rule change allowing for a new program to train individuals as young as 18 to be permitted to drive big rigs across state lines. The previous minimum permissible age was 21. This is not necessarily a bad decision — think of all the 18-year-olds serving honorably in the U.S. Armed Forces. However, it also doesn’t fill the current gap of more than 80,000 drivers needed to haul goods across this country.

Biden’s vaccine mandates have proven only to exacerbate the current supply chain crisis, and instead of working to relieve the problem, his administration is literally implementing rules to make the problem worse. An estimated 20% of Canadian truck drivers have not received the COVID vaccine — a vaccine that doesn’t prevent infection or transmission, by the way — and will no longer be allowed to haul goods such as lumber into the U.S.

One of the biggest ironies here is that the Biden administration still has no vaccine mandate policy for the millions of illegal immigrants pouring into the U.S. across our wide-open southern border. Meanwhile, Mexican truck drivers who seek to enter the U.S. legally through ports of entry to deliver goods will be turned away if they fail to produce a vaccine passport. That’s life under the backwards Biden administration.