In the summer of 1976 "Big Enos" Burdette, a flamboyant Texan aspiring to political office in Georgia, needs a vast quantity of beer for a rally, but the brand of beer he wants is Coors, which at this time cannot be legally transported across the Mississippi, and at least one attempted shipment has already been intercepted by police. To get this job done, Burdette recruits modern-day moonshiner Bo Darville, nicknamed Bandit for his previous exploits, for a hefty six-figure payment. Darville in turn recruits his pal Cledus Snow and his 18-wheeler for the job, entailing driving from Georgia to Texas, picking up 400 crates of Coors beer, and returning to Georgia, all within 28 hours. To draw off the heat of snooping state police, Darville will drive interference for Cledus in a hot Pontiac Trans-Am, the two of them maintaining contact via citizen's-band radios and the seemingly bizarre lingo used within. The trip to Texas and loading of beer goes without interruption, but the trip back to Georgia picks up complications when Darville is stopped by runaway bride Carrie, who is fleeing a forced marriage to the son of a full-of-himself Texas county sheriff, Buford T. Justice. Sheriff Justice's pursuit of his prospective daughter-in-law soon becomes an interstate high-speed pursuit involving police from four states, and also the intervention of varied interstate truckers aiding Darville and Cledus as they close on Enos Burdette's Georgia bash.