How are cops allowed to search people's vehicles without a warrant?

They’re not detaining “people”, they’re doing compliance checks in a regulated industry. It’s not that difficult to see the difference between your average citizen driving down the road and someone who chooses to work in the industry and follow the regs.

 

The legal basis for health inspectors inspecting restaurants is that consent to health inspections is mandatory in order to receive the kind of license that restaurant operators need in order to run a restaurant.

That's completely different than the 4th Amendment issue at play when a peace officer decides to initiate a traffic stop for the sole purpose of conducting a DOT inspection.

 

Driving ,.especially an 80,000lb CMV, is a privilege, not a right. I see your point but when it comes to this , especially the problems we are having these days with incompetent truckers it seems legit..its already been this way regardless.

 

They are exactly the same, both cases are what is called administrative inspections and both cases do not fall under the SC ruling for the fourth protections.

Being in a truck, that is registered for commerce, the truck abides by an additional set of rules that are administrative, FMCSA regulations are accepted in all states so that is where even local drivers face the same as interstate drivers when it comes to inspections and the right of inspection at any time sits on the side of the government to ensure the regulations are followed.

 

I understand that a federal regulation grants authority to state-level officials to conduct inspections and enforce said federal regulations, and I have no problem with that despite the fact that it's technically a violation of federalism.

I don't understand what specific clause in the regulations or in case law creates a carve-out to the 4A's requirement that a peace officer have reasonable suspicion to believe that a violation has occurred in order to initiate a traffic stop. If I get pulled over because I have a taillight out or because I'm speeding then I have no problem with the officer conducting a DOT inspection during the course of that traffic stop. But I have a major problem with an officer being able to initiate a traffic stop absent any articulable reasonable suspicion for the sole purpose of conducting a DOT inspection.

 

https://www.safecarriers.org/media/t0imljrt/cmv-search-seizure.pdf

Commercial Vehicle Inspections and Your Rights as a Driver

That should help explain what everyone has been trying to say. “Any officer” can’t just pull a truck over. They have to be certified to do inspections on commercial vehicles. And it’s a regulated industry so they can inspect to make sure you’re in compliance.

 

First it isn’t a violation of federalism, how it works is the states came up with an agreement between themselves, absent of any federal laws or regulations, to harmonize key laws between themselves. When this occurred, they still had a hodge podge of regulations and laws about trucking and other transportation related issues. Eventually, they started to just using the US DoT regulations, and that included the interstate commerce commission regulations. Now the rule is really simple, they enforce their own laws but then their laws refer to the federal regulations as their laws, which is voluntary. They can have more stringent laws, but overall they just enforce them as their own. When you get a ticket, the ticket refers to a state court, not a federal one.

in the case of trucking, it is a regulated activity, the constitution charges the executive branch with enforcing the law but because the state has enforcement of their own roads, and their laws are the regulations, then it becomes administrative in nature, not criminal. The state has the right to inspect that vehicle and driver to make sure that the regulations are followed, and as badly as I am explaining it, the use of ARS doesn’t even come onto the scene unless there is something criminal that happens but the administrative inspection doesn’t need ARS.

 

They'll also call for a dog who, from the outside can indicate, giving probable cause.

 

I'm not talking about needing ARS to conduct an inspection, I'm talking about needing ARS to initiate a traffic stop when, according to the trooper, the sole purpose of the traffic stop is to conduct a DOT inspection absent any observed violations.

In short, I don't have a problem with being inspected. I have a problem with being pulled over in order to be inspected when officer did not observe any violations prior to initiating the traffic stop.

 

Read the links I posted above. They explain why and give the court cases.