Train Track

California's big rail project may finally be shut down:

The Trump administration wants to cut off all future federal funding which means California would have to come up with that money on its own. The Transportation Department duly began an investigation in February into $4.1 billion in grants awarded under former President Joe Biden, echoing Trump’s efforts in his first term to withdraw a $1 billion grant awarded by the Obama administration. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said during a Wednesday appearance on Fox Business that the Federal Railroad Administration is close to wrapping up the investigation and that if “what many people have reported on is true, we’re gonna pull the funding for this boondoggle endeavor.” Meanwhile, the only group that seems truly happy about this boondoggle are the unions. This has been great for them. They want many more years of over-spending with no end in sight. Union leaders have made it clear that maintaining high-speed rail’s slice of the pie is their top priority. The project has employed nearly 15,000 union workers since construction started in 2015, more than any other infrastructure undertaking in the country. “We believe it’s worked extremely well,” said Chris Hannan, president of the State Building and Construction Trades Council of California. “We’d like to see it get reauthorized for a longer period of time to help us have even more vision as we’re building out the state of California.” It's possible this project could simply wait out the Trump administration. This has been ongoing for nearly 30 years at this point so another four years is really nothing in the scheme of things. The real question is whether other priorities will appeal to Democrats in the state more than keeping unions happy at some point.

Maybe even they will get tired of it...