President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance are pushing for an update to the highway bill to include new railroad laws that would benefit union workers — but it’s fracturing the House Republican caucus, Punchbowl News reported on Thursday.
“The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee will mark up the five-year reauthorization of major highway, transit and infrastructure programs today. The panel is likely to adopt an amendment to add the Rail Safety Act to the package. The measure, a priority for President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance, is opposed by conservatives and the railroad industry,” said the report.
If this language is adopted, noted the report, it “would be a huge win for unions by mandating that two people operate freight trains. Unions have failed to secure that requirement through collective bargaining, and a Biden administration two-person crew rule is being challenged in federal court.”
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA) told reporters, “There’s definitely a lot of members that have expressed concern about it, so you know it’s one of a few items that makes the bill more complicated to pass,” while House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) said, “I know it’s a big priority of the White House, so, you know, we’ll work through that, but I don’t know yet how it’s going to land.”
Republicans typically are skeptical of laws giving such huge concessions to unions. However, this has been a desire of Vance ever since he represented Ohio in the Senate following the East Palestine derailment, which polluted a small town near the Pennsylvania border and has been blamed on unsafe and anti-labor railroad practices.
Rep. David Rouzer (R-NC) told Punchbowl he expects the amendment to pass despite GOP opposition: “It’s an amendment that divides the Republican side of the conference. It’s going to be a big win for labor, and that may serve as a reason for some on our side to vote no, but it’s even more of a reason for Democrats to support the package, even though there’s a lot of things in the package that many of them don’t like.”
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