President Donald Trump has cut off $4 billion in federal funding for California's high-speed "train to nowhere," sparking a furious response from the state's Democrat governor, Gavin Newsom.
The Trump administration says California has breached the contract the federal government reached when it initially agreed to help build the high-speed rail project, which was first approved by voters in 2008.
“The Railroad we were promised still does not exist, and never will,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “This project was Severely Overpriced, Overregulated, and NEVER DELIVERED."
The original plan was to build an 800-mile track connecting the state's two biggest cities, San Francisco and Los Angeles, by 2020.
Newsom later downsized that ambitious vision to a 171-mile stretch of the Central Valley. The California High-Speed Rail Authority now hopes to connect Merced and Bakersfield by 2033, but a 300-page compliance review by the Federal Railroad Administration determined that even that small portion of the original plan is underfunded and has "no viable path" to completion.
Calling the bullet train saga a “story of broken promises," the administration pointed to ballooning costs -- from roughly $33 billion in the beginning to $135 billion -- and repeated delays that have slowed progress to a standstill. To date, not a single track of rail has been laid down.
“After over a decade of failures, CHSRA’s mismanagement and incompetence has proven it cannot build its train to nowhere on time or on budget,” said Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy. “It’s time for this boondoggle to die.”
The federal government's $4 billion share accounts for about a quarter of the total funding. The total projected cost would pay for roundtrip flights for every resident of San Francisco and L.A., Duffy said.
The governor, who took office in 2019, has repeatedly sparred with Trump over California's left-wing policies.
Trump last month signed a resolution that blocks California from implementing its first-in-the-nation ban on gas-powered cars.
Newsom is now suing to block Trump from canceling the federal government's share of bullet train funding, calling it a "heartless" act of retaliation that will hurt residents of the Central Valley, one of the state's poorest regions.
“Trump’s termination of federal grants for California high-speed rail reeks of politics. It’s yet another political stunt to punish California. In reality, this is just a heartless attack on the Central Valley that will put real jobs and livelihoods on the line. We’re suing to stop Trump from derailing America’s only high-speed rail actively under construction," Newsom said.
California authorities have defended the slow progress, citing over 50 structures built, including viaducts, bridges, and overpasses.
But skepticism is widespread, with Democratic Assemblymember Rebecca Bauer-Kahan telling a recent budget hearing that her constituents "overwhelmingly believe” the state has been reckless with its spending on the project.
