Biden flew 30 armed EPA agents from the Lower 48 to Alaska to raid a National Guard veteran's diesel shop.
Trump flewto Alaska and gave two more men their lives back.
What Trump did on that Alaska stage is something no president does in front of a crowd.
Biden Used the Clean Air Act to Wage War on Alaska Diesel Truck Owners
The Biden administration skipped the letter and the civil complaint and went straight to flying 30 armed EPA agents from California, Washington, and Oregon to Wasilla, Alaska – military-style tactical raid, body armor included – to arrest a National Guard veteran named Mac Spurlock for modifying diesel emissions systems on trucks.
Spurlock wasn't building bombs – he was keeping engines from dying in subzero cold.
Obama-era emissions regulations mandated Diesel Exhaust Fluid systems that fail in extreme cold – locking trucks into "limp mode" at 5 mph – and in Alaska, a stranded truck isn't an inconvenience, it's a death sentence.
The Biden EPA didn't care about that.
They cared about enforcement numbers – and about the political profile of their targets.
Instead of going after major industrial polluters with expensive legal teams, Biden's EPA sent armed agents to small shops – mechanics who had no resources to fight back against the federal government.
The EPA's charging theory, attorney Justin Savage told a House Judiciary subcommittee this past year, "appears to have been a favorite weapon of the Biden Administration to pursue truck enthusiasts who, coincidentally, are overwhelmingly supporters of President Trump."
The House Oversight Committee called the hearing "From Protection to Persecution: EPA Enforcement Gone Rogue Under the Biden Administration" – not a podcast title, but the official name of a congressional investigation.
Obama started it – EPA agents in full body armor landing by helicopter to raid plaster miners in a town called Chicken, Alaska – and Biden picked up right where he left off.
Alaska Republican Senator Dan Sullivan had been screaming about this for years.
"The EPA is a SWAT team," Sullivan told EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin during his confirmation hearing, asking point-blank whether EPA agents should even carry firearms.
Zeldin's answer: "Who signed off on that?"
Trump Signed Unconditional Pardons at Alaska Rally for Two More Diesel Truckers
The first wave of pardons came in July, when Trump cleared nine people convicted of Clean Air Act violations – including Spurlock, the Wasilla mechanic Biden's EPA raided in 2022.
Spurlock told reporters he was "just thankful" – and Sullivan called it a turning point in the fight against Biden's weaponized EPA.
In a Wasilla rally this week, Trump added two more names.
Zachary Czubac and Patrick Fleming – two Alaskan truckers targeted for trying to keep their engines running – received full, unconditional pardons live on stage in front of thousands of Alaskans.
Trump didn't hand it to a staffer – he signed it himself, right there at the rally.
"We put them in jail?!" Trump told the crowd. "Well, I heard about it… I'm giving each one an unconditional pardon. That means you're as clear as a newborn baby's a**."
Trump joked it was "worth the eight hours in a plane."
The rally was part of Trump's push to hold the Senate – Sullivan is locked in a tight race against Democrat Mary Peltola despite Alaska voting for Trump by 13 points in 2024 – and Trump crossed the continent to campaign for him with three weeks left.
Biden turned the EPA into a political weapon aimed at the kind of men who vote Republican, drive American trucks, and serve in the National Guard.
The House Oversight Committee hearing documented it under oath.
Trump's EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin has spent the past year tearing down the legal framework that made those raids possible – ending criminal prosecutions for defeat device cases, pulling DEF sensor mandates that had been stranding trucks in cold states – and Trump is clearing the names of every man Biden's government targeted.
The Left spent four years calling Trump a threat to democracy while Biden's EPA flew armed agents across the country to kick in the doors of diesel mechanics.
Czubac and Fleming drive diesel trucks for a living, and Biden tried to jail them for fixing their engines – Trump signed their names clean on a stage in Wasilla after flying eight hours to get there.
Sources:
- Misty Severi, "Trump issues pardons for Alaskan truckers who were targeted by Biden admin," Just the News, October 13, 2026.
- "Trump pardons 9 people convicted of tampering with emission controls on diesel engines," Fox News, July 3, 2026.
- Fred Lucas, "'Who Signed Off on That?' Lee Zeldin Responds to Gun-Toting EPA Bureaucrats," Daily Signal, January 16, 2025.
- "Higgins Opens Hearing on Biden's Weaponized Environmental Enforcement Targeting Americans and Businesses," House Oversight Committee, September 2025.
- Dan Sullivan, Statement on Mac Spurlock Pardon, U.S. Senate, July 2026.
- "Trump pardons Alaska man: Wasilla mechanic speaks out for the first time," Alaska's News Source, July 9, 2026.
