House Transportation & Infrastructure Committee has marked up and released its five-year surface transportation bill, the BUILD America 250 Act. I won’t attempt to remember what the acronym “BUILD” means: “Building Unrivaled Infrastructure and Long-term Development.” Who came up with that one?
Yes, we need a new surface transportation bill with lots of available funding for rail projects, freight and passenger. But deeply troubling about this iteration is that it includes one of those purposeless, politicized “solution in search of a problem” bills as an amendment: the oxymoronically named “Railway Safety Act,” which by the time some version of BUILD becomes law (and there are several more steps in the sausage-making process) hopefully will be relegated to an obscure red plastic bag floating in the Capitol Hill Cesspool, located beneath the Smithsonian National Zoological Park.
But first, folks, here’s some verbal diarrhea from the Cesspooler-in-Chief, posted on his equally oxymoronic Truth Social platform, in his easily identifiable early-grammar-school-level vocabulary—which sadly seems to have done the trick:
“I have long said that the horrific tragedy that beset East Palestine in 2023, along with Sleepy Joe Biden’s utterly incompetent response, must NEVER happen again. I quickly and strongly stood up for, and visited, the incredible Patriots of East Palestine, an action that forced Biden and FEMA, who had said they would not be sending Federal Aid to East Palestine, to ‘move’ on sending a team. This was a major catastrophe during Biden’s presidency, which had many disasters, from letting the rest of the World empty out their prisons and mental asylums and flood our Great Country, to SURRENDERING Afghanistan. I am, therefore, strongly urging Congress to include the Railway Safety Act, which I strongly endorsed in 2023, in the Surface Transportation Reauthorization Bill. I am asking all Republicans to vote YES when this Bill comes up as an Amendment in the Transportation Committee this week. We must not delay any further on this very important matter! President DONALD J. TRUMP”
He followed this with another silly screed: “Thank you to the great Troy Nehls for fighting for the Citizens of East Palestine, Railway Safety, and my Agenda. I am calling on Transportation Committee Republicans to support his Railway Safety Act Amendment, which is going to be voted on very soon. I have supported the Bill since 2023, and we need to get it done! Thank you for your attention to this matter. President DONALD J. TRUMP”
(Oops, I used the man’s name twice, instead of substituting it with [POTUS 47]. My bad. Insert vomit emoji here.)
Enough silly slime from the Oval Office and its resident Ballroom Builder. Here’s how the Association of American Railroads responded to this legislative lunacy. From AAR President and CEO Ian Jefferies (who is always quite diplomatic, but nevertheless did employ some tough talk):
“Freight railroads have been clear from the beginning of the surface transportation reauthorization process: Rail policy provisions should be targeted, justified by data and tied to clearly demonstrated operational or safety needs. Unfortunately, some provisions advanced today fail that test. Rather than focusing narrowly on evidence-based reforms connected to the actual causes of incidents like East Palestine, the package includes a wide range of extraneous mandates under the veil of safety that will only increase costs throughout the freight network and broader supply chain with no proven safety benefit—ultimately harming rail customers, manufacturers, energy producers, farmers and American consumers already facing significant affordability pressures. That’s precisely why so many rail customer groups expressed concern about these very provisions.
“This approach is particularly misguided, given that 2025 marked the safest year in freight rail industry history across several key safety measures, including historic lows in derailments, equipment-caused accidents, track-caused accidents and employee injury rates. These gains were achieved through sustained private investment, technological innovation and data-driven safety practices—not static federal mandates. The Railway Safety Act, as written, violates the President’s pledge to lower costs, and is an unfortunate example that politics and special-interest pressure can sometimes usurp sound, data-driven policymaking during proceedings.
“Today’s markup is the first step in what will be a long legislative process, and freight railroads will continue working constructively with lawmakers to support policies that strengthen safety, promote innovation and preserve an efficient and competitive freight transportation system. At a time when Congress is simultaneously greenlighting autonomous transportation technologies in other sectors, efforts to include rail policies that lock yesterday’s operating models into federal law are nothing more than hypocrisy.”
Amen, brother Ian!
For more detail, let’s hear from AAR Senior Vice President of Communications Ted Greener:
“It is important to distinguish between legitimate East Palestine-related safety reforms and the much broader package of unrelated labor and operational mandates that have now been politically wrapped into the BUILD America 250 Act. Too much of the coverage and rhetoric around the Railway Safety Act has misleadingly conflated the legislation with ‘justice for East Palestine’ when, based on the National Transportation Safety Board’s own findings, many of the bill’s core provisions have little to nothing to do with the actual causes of the derailment. (Download the AAR-provided spreadsheet for comparisons below.)
“I would challenge anyone to ask Railroad Subcommittee Chair Troy Nehls (R-Tex.), what is in the Railway Safety Act that is needed and related to the NTSB findings? Why did he oppose this bill in 2023, but now supports it? What specific market failures does this bill address?
“Railroads sympathize with the people of East Palestine, and any community impacted by a rail incident. But politics has increasingly subsumed this debate, and many in Washington have lost the plot. This should never have been a binary exercise between caring about safety and opposing sweeping federal mandates. If Congress were serious about addressing the actual lessons of East Palestine, lawmakers would have focused narrowly on the NTSB findings and targeted, evidence-based reforms—not a litany of longstanding special-interest priorities and unrelated operational restrictions.
“There are several major provisions in the Railway Safety Act that extend far beyond the underlying incident and broader safety evidence:
“Federal Crew Size Mandate: Codifies minimum two-person crews into federal law despite an existing FRA rule already in place, existing collective bargaining obligations and no demonstrated causal link between crew size and accident prevention. East Palestine itself occurred with a three-person crew.
“Expanded Manual Inspection Mandates: Requires additional inspections regardless of improving safety trends or the rapid emergence of advanced automated inspection technologies, predictive analytics and machine vision systems that are already improving safety outcomes.
“Train Length/Operational Restrictions: Opens the door to broader federal intervention into train operations and network management that could reduce efficiency, capacity and fluidity across the freight network.
“Prescriptive Detector Standards: Mandates fixed wayside detector spacing and deployment rules that critics argue risk locking current-generation technology into federal statute just as next-generation monitoring systems are rapidly evolving.
“Expanded Hazardous Materials Regulations: Broadens regulatory requirements well beyond measures directly tied to the actual causes identified by investigators in East Palestine.
“More broadly, the Railway Safety Act would impose tens of billions of dollars in direct and indirect compliance costs across the freight rail network and broader economy—costs that ultimately flow to farmers, manufacturers, energy producers, retailers and consumers.
“Industry groups across the board have opposed this bill—not just railroads. Workers and businesses depend on an efficient freight network just as much as rail labor does. And these workers matter just as much as rail workers. U.S. economic prosperity is not a zero-sum game.
“The larger context also matters: 2025 marked the safest year in freight rail industry history across several major safety categories, including historic lows in derailments, equipment-caused accidents, track-caused accidents and employee injury rates. Those gains were achieved through sustained private investment, technology deployment and data-driven operational improvements—not rigid federal mandates.”
As far as Rep. Nehls is concerned, “he may not be running for reelection, but he and his colleagues—Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) and Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) quickly come to mind as examples—need no reminder of the consequences of not being Administration poodles,” Railway Age Capitol Hill Contributing Editor Frank. N. Wilner observes. “Vice President Vance wants this bill, and it has been well-reported that the White House has out-lobbied railroads big time to turn Nehls and others.
“While Nehls is retiring from Congress at the end of this session, his identical twin brother, Trever Nehls, is running as a Republican to succeed him and will be seeking the endorsement of Vance and POTUS 47.
“Of note, during the 2024 election cycle when Troy Nehls was running, he received railroad and rail union contributions, according to Open Secrets, which tracks campaign finance. SMART-TD contributed $3,000; the Association of American Railroads, $1,000; BNSF, $1,000; CSX, $4,500; Norfolk Southern, $6,000; and Union Pacific, $7,500. The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen is not shown as having made PAC contributions to Troy Nehls.”
Twenty-three months ago, Wilner provided a heads-up on this ethically challenged former Texas sheriff in his August 2024 Watching Washington column:
Finally, here’s a bit of history on attempts to legislate two-person crews, from Wilner:
“Since 2013, SMART-TD has unsuccessfully sought congressional legislation mandating two-person train crews:
- “H.R. 3040 (82 co-sponsors), introduced in 2013 by Rep. Michael H. Michaud (D-Me.) and Rep. Chellie Pingree (D-Me.), failed to exit the Transportation & Infrastructure Committee.
- “S. 2784 (3 co-sponsors), introduced in 2014 by Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), failed to exit the Commerce Committee.
- “H.R. 1763 (69 co-sponsors), introduced in 2015 by Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska), failed to exit the Transportation & Infrastructure Committee.
- “H.R. 233 (120 co-sponsors), introduced in 2017 by Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska), failed to exit the Transportation & Infrastructure Committee.
- “S. 2360 (13 co-sponsors), introduced in 2018 by Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.Dak.), failed to exit the Commerce Committee.
- “S. 1979 (15 co-sponsors), introduced in 2019 by Sen. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), failed to exit the Commerce Committee.
- “H.R. 1748 (141 co-sponsors), introduced in 2019 by Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska), failed to exit the Transportation & Infrastructure Committee.
- “H.R. 3684 (5 co-sponsors), introduced in 2021 by Rep. Peter A. DeFazio (D-Ore.), was passed by the House as part of a broader bill, but its twp-person crew mandate was deleted by a House-Senate conference committee.
- “H.R. 1674 (17 co-sponsors), introduced in 2023 by Rep. Christopher R. Deluzio (D-Pa.), failed to exit the Transportation & Infrastructure Committee.
- “S. 576 (11 co-sponsors), introduced in 2023 by Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and Sen. J.D. Vance (R–Ohio), was reported out of the Senate Commerce Committee but failed to receive a vote on the Senate floor.
- “H.R. 8996 (33 co-sponsors), introduced in 2024 by Rep. Troy E. Nehls R-Tex.), failed to exit the Transportation & Infrastructure Committee.
- “H.R. 7748, introduced in 2026 by Rep. Chris Deluzio (D-Pa.), co-sponsored by Nick LaLotta (R-N.Y.), John Garamendi (D-Ca.), Michael A. Rulli (R-Ohio), Sarah Elfreth (D-Md.), Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.), Thomas R. Suozzi (D-N.Y.), and Michael Lawler (R-NY), exited the Transportation & Infrastructure Committee as an amendment to the BUILD America 250 Act.
- “S. 3903, introduced in 2026 by Sen. Jon Husted (R-Oio), co-sponsored by Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.), Maria Cantwell (D-Was.), John Fetterman (D-Pa.), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Roger Marshall (R-Kan.), Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) and Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.), is pending in the Commerce Committee.
“Note the pattern in the bills introduced. Until Vance saw a populist opportunity, with Republican members of Congress falling in line as this Administration’s living-in-fear poodles do, former T&I Chairperson Don Young of Alaska was the only Republican supporting such legislation. Why? SMART-TD and predecessor UTU ’channeled’ through Young, based on his guidance, their union PAC contributions intended for House Republicans. PAC soft power has many flavors.”