NASA administrator Sean Duffy visits the Neil A. Armstrong Operations and Control Building on the Kennedy Space Center for Space Launch Complex 39A earlier than the NASA and SpaceX Launch Crew-11 mission to the International Space Station on July 31, 2025 in Cape Canaveral, Florida.
Miguel J. Rodriguez Carrillo | Getty Images
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy pulled $175 million from California’s high-speed rail venture on Tuesday, only a month after canceling $4 billion in federal grants.
Duffy cited 4 initiatives associated to the broader California high-speed rail initiative that may lose funding, together with observe extensions, grade separations, design work and the development of a rail station in Madera. Duffy mentioned the total venture has to date incurred $15 billion in prices, calling it a “boondoggle.”
“In twenty years, California has not been able to lay a single track of high-speed rail,” Duffy mentioned in a statement. “The waste ends here. As of today, the American people are done investing in California’s failed experiment. Instead, my Department will focus on making travel great again by investing in well-managed projects that can make projects like high-speed rail a reality.”
An aerial picture reveals building staff constructing the Hanford Viaduct over Highway 198 and previous agricultural fields as a part of the California High Speed Rail (CAHSR) transit venture in Hanford, California, on February 12, 2025.
Patrick T. Fallon | AFP | Getty Images
The California High-Speed Rail Authority didn’t instantly reply to CNBC’s request for remark.
Duffy additionally directed the Federal Railroad Administration on Tuesday to overview all obligated grants for the venture.
In July, the administration canceled all the railroad group’s federal funding following an FRA report that discovered “serious concerns” with the venture’s viability, together with an alleged lack of ability to finish the venture by its deadline and claims of breached phrases of its contract.
California filed to sue the Department of Transportation in July for its “illegal” motion. In an op-ed in The Sacramento Bee, Duffy replied by writing that California Gov. Gavin Newsom “has no clue what functional government looks like.”
The venture was initially envisioned after a state poll measure handed in 2008 with the aim of connecting San Francisco and Los Angeles in underneath three hours, but it surely was later cut down to serve a shorter 170-mile stretch between Merced and Bakersfield.
According to the FRA, the present iteration of the plan was projected to value round $22 billion with an estimated finish date of 2033.
The railroad system beforehand informed CNBC that the majority of its funding is supplied by the state, not the federal government.