Editor’s Note: This edition of Morning Transportation is published weekdays at 10 a.m. POLITICO Pro Transportation subscribers hold exclusive early access to the newsletter each morning at 6 a.m. Learn more about POLITICO Pro’s comprehensive policy intelligence coverage, policy tools and services, at politicopro.com.
— Lawmakers are back in D.C. after a monthlong break and they have a full plate headlined by a looming appropriations deadline.
Story Continued Below
— The Trump administration has stepped up its offensive on car companies that sided with California over emissions standards with a strongly worded letter from the EPA and DOT and by launching a DOJ investigation.
— The remote identification rule was delayed again: Seven words the drone industry is sick of hearing.
IT’S MONDAY: Thanks for tuning in to POLITICO’s Morning Transportation, your daily tipsheet on all things trains, planes, automobiles and ports. Get in touch with tips, feedback or song lyric suggestions at smintz@politico.com or @samjmintz.
“I got a hired car and a record deal / I got an old guitar and a pedal steel.”
LISTEN HERE: Follow MT’s playlist on Spotify. What better way to start your day than with songs (picked by us and readers) about roads, rails, rivers and runways.
THEY’RE BAAACK: Lawmakers return to town today after more than a month of hiking, baseball games and relaxation (OK, probably some town halls and factory tours, too) and there’s a ton on their plates when it comes to transportation.
Approps: The first order of business is appropriations. A continuing resolution seems likely, given the rapidly approaching Sept. 30 deadline, and POLITICO’s budget team has reported that a CR through late November or early December is in the works. In case you missed it, Pro’s Jennifer Scholtes talked to David Price, who chairs the House panel overseeing transportation spending, about what the next few months will look like, including the debate over transportation policy riders. Provisions that engender partisan division will be dropped from the bill come conference time, he said. The Senate will get to work this month introducing and marking up its 12 spending bills, including Transportation-HUD.
Boeing: Transportation committees in both chambers are still looking into two Boeing 737 MAX crashes and the FAA certification process that allowed the plane to enter into service. There have been whispers that House and Senate members are working on legislation to address FAA aircraft certification and it’s possible bills could come out in the next few months.
Surface transportation: The Senate has passed a surface transportation bill through committee, and has tentatively planned a floor vote for the fall. The House is much farther behind; Transportation Chairman Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.) is planning to introduce his own surface legislation this winter. Arguably the most important work, though, will take place in the Senate Finance Committee, which is responsible for figuring out how to pay for the Senate bill. “Senate leaders on both sides of the aisle have ruled out increasing the gas tax, the simplest and most obvious way of raising substantial funds for transportation,” our Tanya Snyder writes in her state-of-play story. But a Senate GOP aide told Tanya that passing the ambitious legislation “doesn’t feel impossible, even given the hefty price tag.” “Where Congress has a will to spend money, it finds a way,” the aide said.
Driverless cars: Staff in both chambers are working on a sequel to the self-driving vehicle legislation that sputtered out at the end of the last Congress. It’s unclear if we’ll see bill text any time soon, though, as many of the issues that sunk AV START haven’t been solved.
TRUMP’S WAR ON CAR COMPANIES: The administration is going on the offensive against a group of four automakers that have teamed up with California to defy its fuel efficiency rules, with DOJ opening an antitrust probe into the deal between California and Ford Motor Co., Honda, BMW and Volkswagen, Pro Energy’s Zack Colman reports. General counsels from DOT and EPA also warned that the deal appears to be “unlawful and invalid,” per Pro’s Anthony Adragna. “In a letter to California Air Resources Board Chairman Mary Nichols, the agencies warned of ‘legal consequences’ if the state did not move immediately to ‘disassociate’ CARB from the commitments made by the automakers,” he writes.
Barb McQuade, a University of Michigan law professor, tweeted that the DOJ investigation “raises a red flag.” The Sherman Act “prohibits agreements for purpose or effect of limiting competition, but DOJ can’t use antitrust law to derail deal solely to undermine Calif’s higher emissions standards,” McQuade wrote.
What’s next: POLITICO’s Alex Guillén and Daniel Lippman reported last week that the administration is considering finalizing a rule that would block California from enforcing its own strict greenhouse gas emissions auto standards.
FRUSTRATION IN DRONE INDUSTRY AS REMOTE ID PUSHED BACK AGAIN: Here’s a familiar phrase for MT readers: The remote identification rule is delayed again. The regulation governing drones, which is a gateway rule for several other important rulemakings, has been pushed back to December, our Brianna Gurciullo reports. Other aviation news from DOT’s significant rulemakings report last week include a proposed rule on drone flights around critical infrastructure, which was delayed to next September, and an advance notice of proposed rulemaking on rest requirements for flight attendants, which is now expected next month.
The drone industry expressed disappointment with the rule delay. “The need for remote identification cannot be overstated, as the advancement of the UAS industry depends on identifying and tracking UAS flying in the airspace,” the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International said in a statement. Brendan Schulman, a vice president at drone manufacturer DJI, weighed in, too: “These delays are impeding important solutions to security and accountability challenges.”
Elsewhere, a proposed rule for a new research pilot on automated vehicles is expected next January and another on removing regulatory barriers to driverless cars is moving forward with a due date in August 2020, Tanya reports. A vehicle-to-vehicle communications regulation, though, remains sidelined with no set publication date and no explanation for the delay.
CHINESE DRONE WORRIES HAVE NOT CROSSED THE ATLANTIC: As the U.S. panics about China’s dominance in the global drone industry, Europe has “barely blinked,” POLITICO Europe’s Saim Saeed writes in a new story published over the weekend. European governments and militaries are increasingly turning to Chinese drone manufacturer DJI for their unmanned aviation needs. MT readers will know that U.S. officials, including at DHS, have warned they don’t trust DJI drones with sensitive data. In Europe, those worries are less prevalent. “No one is actually concerned,” said Ulrike Franke, a policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations.
DOT IG DINGS FRA: The DOT inspector general said in a report published last week that the FRA should do a better job utilizing the data it collects on rail crossing accidents. As your MT host writes: “The agency’s accident prediction formula has not been updated since 2013, the IG found, and the lack of a comprehensive guide for crossing inspectors means that approaches vary across the country.”
ANOTHER TAKE ON TEXAS CENTRAL: Opponents of the Texas Central high-speed rail project shot back at the company’s announcement last week that the federal government was moving forward with the regulatory process. “In the 52-year history of the FRA, it has never granted a Rule of Particular Applicability (RPA), and the process has not even been clearly defined,” Texans Against High-Speed Rail said in a statement, noting the RPA is far from final approval. “It now has to go through a lengthy rule-making process that essentially creates a regulatory carveout, or monopoly, specific to the Japanese Shinkansen HSR technology, and there is no time frame for completion or guarantee of what the rule will require.”
SPOTTED: Staff from former President George W. Bush’s DOT held a reunion in D.C. over the weekend with the more than 115 attendees, including former Secretary Norman Mineta, Maria Cino, Michael Jackson, Jeffrey Rosen, Marion Blakey, Shane Karr, Husein Cumber, Quintin Kendall, DJ Gribbin, Nicole Nason, Roger Nober, Joel Szabat, Luke Frans, Rich Juliano and Sean O’Hollaren.
— “Former Boeing official subpoenaed in 737 MAX probe won’t turn over documents, citing Fifth Amendment protection.” Seattle Times.
— “Boeing suspends load test for new 777X aircraft.” Reuters.
— “Ship overturns near Georgia port; 4 crew members missing.” Associated Press.
— “Tesla Model S will take on famed Nürburgring racetrack, Elon Musk says.” The Verge.
— “Unhappy with your travel loyalty program? Join the crowd.” Washington Post.
DOT appropriations run out in 22 days. The FAA reauthorization expires in 1,484 days. Highway and transit policy is up for renewal in 389 days.
