[Freight Weekly] Sean Duffy Is DOT Secretary Now. Then, A Plane Crash.

⚠️Sean Duffy Is the Transportation Secretary. Then, American Eagle Flight 5342.⚠️

President Donald Trump’s first transportation crisis is an unfortunate collision mid-air with an American Airlines/American Eagle jet carrying about 60 people from Wichita, Kan., and four crew members of a U.S. military helicopter. They plunged into the Potomac.

• The U.S. Senate confirmed Sean Duffy, a former GOP congressman, as Trump’s nominee to lead the Department of Transportation. The department regulates virtually every aspect of transportation and infrastructure that enables all supply chain flows. These agencies include MARAD, NHTSA, FRA, and (yes) the FAA.

• He received bipartisan support and was considered one of the least controversial nominees to Donald Trump’s cabinet, compared to the recently confirmed Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and the FBI nominee, Kash Patel.

• Duffy was sworn in by Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas on Jan. 28.

• “We are already hard at work executing the president's vision to usher in a golden age of transportation by taking immediate action to remove government overreach and lower costs for hardworking Americans,” explained Mr. Duffy.

• However, one of the criticisms of Duffy was his seemingly scant experience in the realm of transportation policy. Granted, his predecessor, former Secretary Pete Buttigieg, lacked in the same manner but was nonetheless selected to lead DOT.

• Duffy’s confirmation came two days before the accident that took place at the Reagan National Airport, which is believed to have claimed dozens of lives. He does so at a time when Trump’s senior officials in the Executive Office of the President are working to significantly cut spending and regulations, especially safety rules and continuity planning related to air traffic control operations.

• Trump blamed failures in ATC ops on DEI programming and diversity hiring at the agencies, citing absolutely no evidence, and has been found false by the vast majority of media. Duffy addressed the reporters but didn’t dismiss Trump’s claim.

• Speaking in a far more balanced tone than that of Trump, Sec. Duffy explained, “We are going to take responsibility at the [U.S.] Department of Transportation and the FAA, to make sure we have the reforms that have been dictated by President Trump in place to make sure that these mistakes do not happen again.”

• But that isn’t going to stop President Trump from thinking what he’s going to think and waste valuable investigative resources. Axios reports that Trump has asked for a review of diversity hiring and its impact on aviation regulatory functions due to absolutely no link or connection to be a reason for the AE Flight 5342 crash.

• In addition to the crisis, several critics observe that Trump’s shakeup of agency leadership, especially at FAA and the Transportation Security Administration under the Department of Homeland Security, were more plausible contributions to any shortcomings from the front of ATC operations, management, and staffing.

• Additionally, Trump has appointed Chris Rocheleau as a temporary acting FAA administrator, as no indication of an FAA nominee has been made at this time.

Bottom line: Just say the quiet part out loud: Trump’s purge of agency executives from before his tenure in the White House and the disorganized nature of the crisis his Secretary Duffy was thrown into aren’t a product of DEI or left-wing sabotage. Instead, a new administration seeking to upend the status quo, paired with a series of unfortunate events, led to the crisis now. All we can do now is watch how Mr. Duffy handles himself.

PERSPECTIVE: “Trump links crash to DEI ‘because I have common sense.’ But that’s just prejudice talking” - The Kansas City Star

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