Ex-Reality TV star, Congressman, and Fox Business personality Sean Duffy was tapped to become Secretary of Transportation. He’s now a shoe-in for confirmation. Democrats, and even airline unions, are lining up to support him.
As Ted Reed notes, even far-left activist and flight attendant union AFA-CWA Sara Nelson has fallen into line.
I think we can work with him. I’m pleased with his focus on safety and on rebuilding the air transportation system, on hiring and training air traffic controllers, which was a very welcome emphasis during his confirmation hearing.
Reed further notes that “U.S. Senator Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) announced that she had secured a commitment from Duffy to uphold the 1,500-hour pilot certification standard at his confirmation hearing. Maintaining the standard has long been an ALPA priority.”
That’s unfortunate.
- The ‘1500 hour rule’ was an opportunistic barrier to entry to become a co-pilot (driving up both the time and cost that it takes), limiting entry into the pilot profession, creating artificial scarcity to drive up wages.
- ALPA, the largest pilot union, seized on the Colgan Air crash to push that pet agenda item, even though both pilots involved in that incident had well over this level of experience.
- Commercial pilots fly every day in the United States with fewer hours – they’re just employed by airlines like Lufthansa and Air France.
- And the hours themselves have nothing to do with simulating real-world flight conditions. They’re usually clear air touch and go’s in and out of the same airports over and over. But they don’t even have to be that. Pilots can rack up their hours in a hot air balloon. The balloon can even be tethered and it still counts.
- Pilots develop bad habits in the quest for these hours that have to be trained out of them once they’re hired on by commercial carriers.
In his Senate hearing, Duffy pivoted away from past opposition to Amtrak funding. He explained away past opposition as from “when I represented northern Wisconsin, and we didn’t have any Amtrak” and got onboard by saying that “this committee has spoken loudly about Amtrak and rail in their home communities.”
Duffy seems to be saying he’ll do the things that unions and Democrats want at this point. We’ll see if that holds. But if it doesn’t here, it’s likely to with another one of Trump’s cabinet picks that these unions support.
Reed also notes the excited endorsement by airline unions over President-elect Trump’s selection of former Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer as Secretary of Labor.
She has the endorsement of American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten, as well. She was one of only 3 House Republicans to endorse the PRO Act which extends California’s strict independent contractor regulations nationwide, abolish ‘right to work’ laws in 27 stats, and expand the power of the NLRB. She also favors collective bargaining by state employees. This is a very non-traditional Republican pick, reflecting how voter alignment has shifted, and Trump seeks to court and repay union support.
Ah, so unions are good, after all. Bah! We’ll see whether this ‘talk’ lasts.
Some people in Duffy’s former Congressional district in Wisconsin would use Amtrak in Wisconsin. Drive from where his district office turned out to be to Tomah to catch Amtrak. And there used to be passenger train service up to Minocqua in Wisconsin and that isn’t even that a long drive to where Duffy went to high school.
The dude doesn’t even know his own state well. Thank the Koch brothers — and Scott Walker — for making this guy. Fortunately, their Hovde guy lost.
I puked in my mouth when you said Randi. This guy is a total loser. Where are the reforms? Such a disappointment.
“shoe-in”? I’ve disagreed with those who say AI is writing posts but for someone of your erudition to make such a basic mistake is worrying.
Good grief. Nothing stops the U.S. airlines in their quest to enshittify flying, now they want pilots with less experience so they can save a buck?
Shameless. Thank you Senator Duckworth for putting a line in the sand.