Sean P. Duffy

Built World

Active - terminated Texas Central grant

The United States has never built a true high-speed rail line. For over a decade, Texas Central Railway has attempted to change that with a 240-mile bullet train connecting Houston and Dallas—using Japanese Shinkansen technology to cut a 3.5-hour drive to 90 minutes. On April 14, 2025, the Trump administration terminated a $64 million federal planning grant, calling the project 'a waste of taxpayer funds' and returning the initiative entirely to private control.

Updated 2 days ago

Rule Changes

Criticizing Canada-China EV deal

Canada followed the U.S. in imposing 100% tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles in October 2024. Seventeen months later, Prime Minister Mark Carney flew to Beijing and cut them to 6.1%—the first explicit break with American trade policy since Trump began his tariff offensive.

Updated May 21

Rule Changes

Cabinet official overseeing FAA

Ten people died when Bering Air Flight 445 crashed onto Norton Sound sea ice on February 6, 2025. The Cessna 208B was 1,058 pounds overweight for icing—a fact crash investigators discovered because the FAA doesn't require single-engine commuter operators to keep load manifests.

Updated May 19

Money Moves

Steps aside as Isaacman takes over

One day after his 67–30 confirmation, Jared Isaacman was sworn in on Dec. 18, 2025 as NASA's 15th administrator—walking directly into a White House-driven acceleration campaign that now has his name on the clock, not just the contracts.

Updated May 15

Rule Changes

Leading a DOT-wide push to reduce regulatory burdens

On December 17, 2025, two FHWA rollbacks took effect that sound boring—and matter anyway. The agency removed the formal, on-the-books requirements that told the Forest Service and the Bureau of Indian Affairs how to run safety, bridge, pavement, and congestion management systems for certain federally funded roads.

Updated May 15

Built World

Pushing Congress for “tens of billions” and rapid modernization milestones

The FAA is no longer talking about “modernization” like it’s a distant science project. In a House hearing, Administrator Bryan Bedford said the agency will commit $6 billion by the end of 2025 to upgrade ATC telecom networks and radar surveillance, with a target deployment date of 2028.

Updated May 15

Rule Changes

Overseeing NHTSA rulemaking to reset CAFE standards

On December 3, 2025, President Trump unveiled an NHTSA proposal to slash Biden-era CAFE standards, cutting the 2031 target from about 50.4 mpg to roughly 34.5 mpg. The rule also slows annual increases to 0.25–0.5% from 2% and bans credit trading after 2028, which especially hurts EV-focused companies that sell credits to gasoline-heavy manufacturers.

Updated May 10

Built World

Overseeing federal disengagement from the California project

California voters approved a bullet train in 2008 with a $33 billion price tag and a promise to whisk passengers from San Francisco to Los Angeles by 2020. Eighteen years later, no train has run, the price tag for the full San Francisco–Anaheim line has climbed to roughly $231 billion, and the first segment — Merced to Bakersfield in the Central Valley — is not expected to carry passengers before 2033. On February 28, 2026, the California High-Speed Rail Authority released its Draft 2026 Business Plan, the agency's first full strategic update since the Trump administration pulled $4 billion in federal grants and California abandoned its court fight to get them back.

Updated Apr 27

New Capabilities

In office since January 2025

An estimated 36,640 people died on American roads in 2025—the fewest since 2019 and a 6.7 percent drop from the year before. The death rate fell to 1.10 per 100 million vehicle miles traveled, the second-lowest figure in more than a century of federal recordkeeping, even as Americans drove roughly 30 billion more miles than they did in 2024.

Updated Apr 12

Rule Changes

Serving as Transportation Secretary; leading drone deregulation effort

For nearly a decade, every commercial drone operator in the United States that wanted to fly beyond a pilot's line of sight had to apply for an individual waiver from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) — a slow, bespoke process that capped the industry at small pilot programs. On August 7, 2025, the FAA published a proposed rule that would replace that waiver system with a standardized regulatory pathway, creating a new Part 108 of federal aviation rules specifically for routine beyond-visual-line-of-sight (BVLOS) operations. In January 2026, the FAA reopened the comment period for 14 days (closing February 11, 2026), signaling active refinement of the rule ahead of an expected March 2026 finalization.

Updated Feb 21

Built World

Overseeing final year of IIJA airport disbursements

For five years, the largest airport-funding program in American history pumped roughly $3 billion a year into runways, terminals, and taxiways at more than 3,300 airports. That pipeline is now closing. In December 2025, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) released the fifth and final round of Airport Infrastructure Grant (AIG) formula allocations—$2.89 billion for fiscal year 2026—and opened the last competition for the Airport Terminal Program, worth approximately $1 billion. No successor program exists.

Updated Feb 20

Built World

Overseeing Department of Transportation programs including FAA grants

For decades, small and regional airports have relied on aging air traffic control towers built in the 1960s and 1970s, with limited federal help for upgrades. On January 21, 2026, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) quietly opened a grant window that makes up to $120 million available—six times the annual norm—at 100% federal cost, covering everything from tower reconstruction to the construction of FAA-certified remote towers. It is the final and largest funding round of a five-year program created by the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.

Updated Feb 20