Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy Touts Plans To Build ‘Big Beautiful Infrastructure’

Forbes Breaking News

During Tuesday's House Appropriations Committee hearing, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy delivered a testimony.

Transcript

00:00probably participate. At some point in time today, we do have other hearings going on.

00:04I don't think that she is wishing to give an opening statement, but we'll inject her into

00:10the Q&A when she arrives. And with that, Mr. Secretary, welcome once again to the subcommittee.

00:17We're going to accept your written testimony for the record, and we'll yield the floor to you.

00:22Thank you. Chairman Womack, Ranking Member Clyburn, Chairman Cole, thank you all for

00:29inviting me to this subcommittee, as well as all the subcommittee members. I think it's been about

00:34six years since I've been back to the House. It's a pleasure to see you all. I'm not sure

00:40if there was some plan to bring the greatest voices of the House together in Womack and

00:46Clyburn, but you guys, great voices. Made for media, I think. My aim over the course of this hearing is

00:53to provide you with a sense of how building big, beautiful infrastructure is a top priority of

00:58President Trump's priorities, and how we can all work together in a bipartisan effort to make

01:04that a reality. The infrastructure that connects our people, our states, moves our products is a

01:10priority of the President. Our department over the course of the last hundred days have saved

01:16taxpayers roughly $9.5 billion. Those savings include monies pulled from projects tied to social

01:23justice, to climate requirements, also boondoggle projects, as well as bringing efficiencies to the

01:31department. Now, many of you have asked me about grants and grant agreements and grant announcements.

01:38So just to be clear on this point, we have inherited an unprecedented backlog of 3,200 awards for grants that

01:50were announced by the last administration. However, those 3,200 were left to me to do the grant

01:56agreements on. So the announcement is fun, but the work is really the grant agreement. So there's 3,200

02:03that has been passed off to me. Those are the ones that all of you love to call me on. And by the way,

02:09we're working through that backlog. Many of these projects of the 3,200 date back to 2022. The last

02:16administration, they were unorganized, they were unfocused, as projects around the country were

02:21stalled by inaction and inefficiencies. No one is more frustrated with the inefficiencies of this

02:28process than I am. Currently, there are 10 to 14 different systems to track the status of grants across

02:37the Department of Transportation. There's not one system, there's 10 to 14 systems that are used to

02:42track grants. I'm committed to consolidating all of this information into one dashboard so grantees can

02:51see how money is being spent. All of you can see the progress of grants. I want to bring you that

02:56transparency, but that's also consolidating the system in which the DOT uses to provide that

03:02information to all of you and to the American people. I promise to ensure that transparency as we

03:09move through this process. The Department of Transportation is one of the few non-defense

03:16federal agencies to receive an increase in funding under President Trump's fiscal year 26 budget.

03:22The reason is simple. The president, he's a builder. He loves to build and he wants to build at DOT.

03:31Our budget carefully focuses taxpayer resources on items critical to our most fundamental mission of safety

03:38and investing in transportation infrastructure. We have pushed forward with the approval of 405

03:45grants totaling $4.9 billion in the president's 100 plus days in office. The president's budget of $26.7

03:54billion in new discretionary funding for 2026 is a $1.5 billion increase over 2025, or it's 5.8%

04:05as an increase, which I'm proud to see that we have. We do not want to take additional funds from

04:12hardworking taxpayers for granted in this era of government where it's become too big, too inefficient,

04:19and too wasteful. We have carefully planned for these dollars to fund urgent projects that once built

04:24will serve future generations for decades and I think build and make this country stronger.

04:31And so I'm sure you're going to ask me questions as Mr. Cliburn indicated what's going on with staffing cuts.

04:39We are going to try to make the Department of Transportation more efficient, do more with less.

04:44I'm happy to talk about that. Also, I want to discuss Newark. We are working through the telecom

04:53infrastructure upgrade to take care of the delays. As we speak right now, the FAA has brought in together

05:00all of the airlines who serve Newark to have a conversation about how there can be a delayed

05:07reduction. So if you book your flight, that flight's going to fly. You don't have people at the airport

05:14for, you know, two, four, six hours and then a flight canceled. So we're working through that now.

05:18Hopefully in the next week or two, we'll have additional really good news about the telecom

05:23progress that we've made. And happy to talk about the air traffic control system that we announced

05:30last week. And finally, I know my time is is over, but I do want to say thank you to Tim and Sherry for

05:38coming. I've appreciated their support. I've gotten to know them since January 29th and the loss of their

05:45son, Sam. And they have they have been a force for good. And I'm grateful for their partnership. I'm grateful

05:53they've been they're coming here today. And I think this is a moment where we're trying to pay what happened in late

05:59January, we're trying to pay it forward to make sure we don't have another another set of families of

06:0667 people that have to fight to make sure they have a system that's going to work. So thank you for being here.

06:12And to the committee, thank you for having me. And I'm happy to take the committee's questions.

06:16Thank you, Mr. Secretary.

Category

Transcript

Recommended