At today's Senate Commerce Committee hearing, Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) questioned nominees about passenger rail projects.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00Hi, hello, welcome. Hi, everybody. So, 100 Amtrak trains run through Pennsylvania every day,
00:16including maybe 100 feet just away from where I live in Braddock, Pennsylvania,
00:21serving almost 7 million total passengers in my state. I don't see passenger rail as a political
00:29issue. I mean, you know, everybody ride that. Red, blue. This is about getting people where they
00:37need to be. As a member of this committee, I will always fight to support and defend vital
00:42federal service, and I'm made very clear that I'll work with anyone as long as they're willing
00:48to do that. Since being sworn into the Senate, I've been working to expand passenger rail service
00:55throughout communities across Pennsylvania. One of the projects I'm pushing and want to expand was
01:02passenger rail to Reading, Pennsylvania. So, Mr. Gleason, you made clear in your testimony that you
01:10understand the importance of passenger rail for both big cities and small towns in our state of
01:17Pennsylvania. Can you commit to working with my office and the Schuylkill River Passenger Rail
01:23authority to get this service operational by 2029? Absolutely. I've talked to those people in
01:31Reading for years. They're just like Johnstown. We lost our trains. We have two trains a day.
01:38We need more train service, and I appreciate your support for passenger rail,
01:43and I understand the school, the whole Schuylkill thing needs to be supported. Absolutely.
01:47Does anyone else feel, have anything? So, we feel like sometimes it might be, feel like it's under
01:55siege right now. I mean, is that accurate, or like, do you feel better after the new administration,
02:00or like, what do you think? You mean about passenger rail? Yeah. Yeah, I feel good about it. I feel very good
02:10about it. I think that there seems to be a lot of support amongst the senators and a lot of people I've
02:15talked to. Younger people want to ride the rail now. Our ridership of Amtrak is younger, and more and
02:22more people are looking forward to riding trains. So, the support of the Senate is very important as we
02:28try to expand the passenger rail, and Pennsylvania, outside the Philadelphia area, needs a lot more
02:34support. So, I'm looking forward to working with you for this support.
02:40Okay. So, now let's talk about safety. You know, over two years ago, of course, we all, we were aware
02:54what happened in East Palestine and Ohio, just very close to our border. My colleagues and I
02:59immediately got together and wrote, the Railway Safety Act. The bill made sure tragedies like this
03:07doesn't happen again. That was, that was a strong bill. Very, very bipartisan. The Vice President
03:13was one of the leads on it, and President Trump now said he supports it. In fact, it might be the
03:18only thing that Trump, Vance, and Biden, we can all agree on, on many of these things. But now it's
03:24stalled, and I truly don't understand why that's the case. I mean, I think we should all be on the
03:29same, and be rowing in the same direction. And now, I mean, I live a hundred, a hundred feet away
03:35from an active rail. So, I don't know why we want to prevent all these kinds of derailments.
03:42So, Mr. Fink, can you commit to helping to get this across the line? So, because all of America
03:49deserves this. And this was always being a very, very bipartisan piece of legislation.
03:54Thank you for the question, Senator. We met with your staff last week, and the issues that
03:59you talked about with Mr. Gleason were also discussed with me. So, I heard that and look
04:05forward to working on those issues. As far as legislation, my job is the person that executes
04:12the laws that you pass. So, I'm the FRA administrator. If you pass the law, we are going to make sure
04:18that those laws are properly carried out. That's what I'm looking forward to. Right now, there
04:24I'm waiting for folks to talk to me about the specific legislation, talking with the FRA safety
04:30people. Once you pass it, we will enforce it.
04:34Yeah. I mean, I think we should all agree. I truly, and I ask even my friends on both sides,
04:39like, we're not really sure why we still don't have that passed. But regardless, thank you all
04:45Mr. Fink, Mr. Fogle, Mr. Jenton, and Mr. Gleason, my final question is required of all nominees. If confirmed, do you pledge to work collaboratively with the committee to provide through the timely responses to the committee
05:15the committee's request and to appear before the committee when requested?
05:20Yes, Senator. Yes, Senator. Yes, sir. Yes.
05:25All right. Thank you. I have letters of support from various organizations for Mr. Fink's, Mr. Jenton's, nominations that I ask unanimous consent to be inserted into the hearing record. Without objection, so ordered.
05:41Senators will have until close of business on Thursday, May 15th, to submit questions for the record. The nominee will still close until the business of May 19th to respond to all of those questions. That concludes today's hearing. The committee stands adjourned.