Unfiltered, unbiased, word for word. From the nations capitol to wherever you are, because the opinion that matters the most is your own. If this is what democracy looks like. Cspan, powered by cable. Transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg held a News Conference to outline the impacts of a potential Government Shutdown specifically on air Traffic Controllers and rail inspectors. His remarks from Agency Headquarters in washington, d. C. Are about 25 the minutes. Morning, everyone. Thank you for coming over. [inaudible] all right. I appreciate you coming over. Obviously, were here to urge House Republicans to settle their differences among themselves, come to their senses and honor the deal that they made with President Biden earlier year. If they fail to uphold this basic responsibility, then they will trigger a completely avoidable shutdown. If that happens, then about 84 hours from from now the u. S. Federal government will be forced to close, threatening our economy, our National Security and leaving americans in every state and territory less safe. I want to make clear that the impact of i want to make clear the impact of a potential republican shutdown so that theres no confusion about whats at stake for transportation for working families and for all americans. And just as importantly, i want to talk about whats at stake for all of us if those who are holding this funding hostage get their way in their demands for severe cuts to important federal functions including transportation and safety. But first, i just want to identify with the millions of americans who are looking at whats happening in washington right now in disbelief. Funding the u. S. Government is a basic responsibility of congress. It is not normal that in the most powerful country in the world fringe Congressional Republicans from time to time are able to put the entire country at risk by simply shutting down the government. In particular, im concerned about the casual disregard that is being shown for the people who would be impacted the most. Any House Republican comfortable with shutting down the government should explain themselves directly to these soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines whose paychecks will stop after saturday. And they should explain themselves directly to all of the nonpartisan Civil Servants when who make sure that planes land safely, when inspect trucks and railroads and pipelines to prevent disasters who will have to go without pay. Im also concerned by the context of the cuts that these House Republicans are trying to force. This is a lot of attention goinf attention going to the possible shutdown. In my view, not must have attention going to the objective of that threatened shutdown which is to extract cuts that the overwhelming majority of americans reject. So lets take a minute to review how we got here. This summer President Biden and Speaker Mccarthy shook hands is and made a bipartisan deal to keep this country running, and twothirds of House Republicans vote for that deal. I should note that deal was tough for all sides. Frankly are, it was tough for this department because it meant cutting back on funding for good Infrastructure Projects that we believe in, fixing roads and bridges and airports. But we accepted it because that was the deal. Now a fringe group of House Republicans is refusing to honor that deal, putting them at odds with the majority of their own party as well as the majority of the American People. They are holding key functions of our government hostage to try to get extreme cuts to things like childcare and meals on wheels that so Many Americans count on every day. Let me emphasize what a shutdown would mean for transportation. After everything that we have been through, after all of the disruptions to air travel, especially the ones that we saw last year, we have finally seen cancellations and delays get back down to normal levels. In fact, weve seen cancellations go to a level now that is lower hand it was before the pandemic. Than it was before the pandemic. Weve done that pushing airlines to do better, weve expanded passenger rights, and weve accelerated improvements to faas own staffing and technology. But a shutdown would stop all of that progress. It would mean we would immediately have to stop training new air Traffic Controllers and furlough another 1,000 controllers who are already in the training pipeline. And i want to emphasize the complexity of the hiring and training process means even a shutdown lasting a few days could mean we will not hit our staffing and hiring targets next year. Meanwhile, if those air Traffic Controllers who are it deprives those still working of their paychecks. I want you to imagine the pressure that a controller is already under every time they take their position at work and then imagine the added stress of coming to the that job are from a household with a family that can no longer count on that paycheck. That is the consequence of a shutdown. But also whether theres a shutdown or not, i want to go through some of the things that would happen if house are republicans get their way on cuts. To absorb the 8 cut that they have proposed, we would have to totally freeze fa a a hiring in operational facilities. Wed be set back in modernizing systems like the nodem system that led e to nationwide havoc with just a 90minute outage earlier this year. And whats especially galling is that we see some of these same elected officials who have responded even to weather delays by blaming the administration now turning around and demanding that we cut resources for air Traffic Control. So thats air travel operations. Then you have rulemaking and grants. So we have been advancing some of the strongest customer protections for Airline Passengers many generations in generations. Our office of aviation Consumer Protection has helped passengers get billions of dollars in refunds for canceled flights. Were developing a rule to get passengers compensated for long delays. Were developing rules to make family seating free is so you never have to pay to sit next to your kid. Were enforcing passenger rights. And a shutdown would stop that work in its tracks. Not to mention like helping emergency First Responder dealing with Hazardous Materials and work that goes on to strengthen rail safety regulations. Then theres the daytoday [inaudible] after the Norfolk Southern derailment in East Palestine earlier this year, leaders on both sides of the aisle in congress rightly came together to to start a process to the help make our railroads safer. We are still looking for congress to follow through and actually pass the Railway Safety act. Were not waiting for congress to do our own continued work on safety under current authorities. But again, a are republican shutdown would stunt our work on new safety rules all because some of these same people who rushed to get in front of a camera during the East Palestine derailment aftermath are now demanding education treatment cuts to Railroad Safety inspections. Their proposal would cut 4,000 safety inspections next year alone meaning 11,000 miles of Railroad Track would not get minuted compared to inspected compared to the current levels. So i dont understand how anybody could claim to be serious about Railroad Safety and then turn around and defund our inspectors. And thats just transportation. A republican shutdown would affect everything from National Security and Law Enforcement to food safety and disaster relief. And, again, those House Republicans who created this hostage situation have made clear that their goal is to force extreme, permanent cuts to a lot of those same programs, kinds of programs that millions of working families count on every day. That includes nutrition assistance. There are 7 million women is and children nationwide who rely on federal nutrition assistance. Half the babies born in this country under a republican Government Shutdown, women and children would be potentially turned away at the grocery store. To be clear, the reasons House Republicans are threatening to hut down the government in the first place is because they want to make permanent cuts to that program and others like it. The president , by contrast, is a fighting to the expand it so that every eligible mother, expecting mother and child can get the food that they need. When it comes to our Service Members, there are 1. 3 million active duty troopses who would be forced to work without pay until the government is back up and running, and hundreds of thousands of their civilian colleagues at the department of defense would be furloughed. Reservists drill time and pay is unrecoverable, something that i remember experiencing as a reservist during a previous shutdown. All of this undermines our National Security in very real ways, and its ironic to say the least that some house members who claim to support our military are actively threatening to make our Service Members work without pay. And then under the cuts proposed, is some of the numbers are that 60,000 seniors would lose access to nutrition services, 65,000 children could lose access to childcare, wed have 40,000 fewer educators affecting 26 million students, 20,000 veterans would lose their housing assistance, and 300 more pounds of fentanyl, 600 more pounds of methamphetamines would be let into country. And and their proposal leaves out sital a funding that the president has requesting for things like rebuilding American Communities hit by climate disasters, fighting fentanyl trafficking and helping ukrainians defend themselves against the russian invasion. My point is there is no good time for a Government Shutdown, but this is a particularly bad a time for a Government Shutdown. Especially when it comes to transportation. The consequences would be disruptive and dangerous, and so would the longterm consequences of paying the ransom to the avoid it in the form of savage cuts to safety, infrastructure and other President Biden keepses his word and that includes the promises that he made to the American People and the deal he struck with Speaker Mccarthy. It is up to those in the house of representatives to live up to the their word, to to not play political games with peoples lives, to keep the government up and running and deliver for the people. Thanks again for coming and happy to take that few take a few questions. [no audio] yeah, this is a dynamic industry that really relies on certainty especially in the context of some of the rule makings and the work thats going on. Now, its really complex and nuanced across the different parts of the grant work. Whats affected, the good news is a lot of what were doing on ev chargers and other areas is [inaudible] meaning that would continue. Although even that work could get gummed up by other Administrative Functions that are not working the way they should in the context of a shutdown. But rulemaking is a good example. We can get you more specifics across different parts to of the agency, but a lot of our rulemakinging activity the would be stopped and those relevant people would be furloughed when we need that to keep up with all the changes that are going on. [inaudible] reporter assure the flying pick that a public that they will be safe as they continue to travel during a Government Shutdown during sort of all the troubles and pressures and the additional pressure that would be on the air Traffic Controllers . Well, our air Traffic Controllers and safety personnel are going to keep going and doing their job to the extent that theyre allowed to in the context of a shutdown. But theyre doing it under added stress that is uncalled for, avoidable and preventing bl. Look, theyre pros, and they do whats required of them just like our Service Members. But it certainly doesnt help with that safetycritical job for them to come to work with the stress of not getting paid. And i would add that each passing day it gets more difficult and more complicated, and different parts of the agency that arent coming in, that catches up to the rest of the system. And i think thats something we saw historically the last time where overtime began to take more and more of a toll on air Traffic Controllers, on tsa officers who also, of course, arent getting paid. And, of course, we count on them every day to keep us safe. With hi hi, fox news channel. Do you think that President Biden should sit down with Speaker Mccarthy in the next three days to try and negotiate this out and prevent a shutdown, and what would that conversation look like . Well, we dont have to speck speculate. Yes, its absolutely appropriate for the president and speaker to sit down and negotiate a deal, and they did earlier this year. All were asking is for the speaker to stick with the deal that they already worked out. [inaudible] the Training Program would be cut. What does that the mean in the average person right now and in the months and years to come . Is so the context is this we have obviously seen a lot of disruptions to air traffic especially over the last year. Some of those are caused by weather, some of those were caused by airline issues, but a factor can be the availability of air Traffic Control staffing. Weve scene a gap that is over many years between the level of staffing we need and the level of staffing weve got. We finally have that headed in the right direction. Hired 1500 this year, our budget calls for 1800 controllers [inaudible] but that cant happen if we get stopped in our tracks with training. At the end of day, that means more shortageses and more outages, and that can contribute to cancellations and delays. Same thing with the i. T. Side, especially if these cuts go through. We need to go faster, not slower on things like updating the nodem system is and many other faa technologies that have needed upgrades for a long time. You slow that down, youre increasing the chance that theres going to be some issue that leads to disruptions like cancellations, delays for passengers just going about their trip, their job. [inaudible] greg wallace from cnn. The faa is going potentially without a reauthorization. How would that compound the effects of a shutdown, and what would the impacts we would see there . Thats right. The consequences of a shutdown, there are consequences of the cuts that house, some house members are demanding as their price of avoiding a shutdown, and then there are the consequences of a lapse in faa reauthorization. That would have a number of immarkets. Concern impacts. A lot of people wouldnt be able to effectively do their jobs. We would not be able to collect revenue or wed spend money from the trust fund, and some of that might never come back in. Effectively, its kind of like a tax holiday for airline charges that never come in through airports and meet other critical needs. So its right alongside the other forms of disruption something that we just dont need right now, and were urging a reauthorization or at the very least an extension to keep things operating [inaudible] thanks for doing this. In 2019 when the last significant Government Shutdown occurred, the faa had to lay off thousands of aviation safety inspectors and engineers. In fact, about two weeks in recalled about 17000 safety officials 17000. Are you in a different posture . Do you still have to furlough safety officials . What discretion, if any, do you have at this point to handle a potentially lengthy shutdown . Yes, teams are working through the finer points of that right now while we continue to hope and expect that the House Republicans will come to terms with each other and with everybody else. Were obviously preparing for any eventuality. Part of the upheaval is you do get these scenarios where people are furloughed at first and and then recalled which just contributes to the upheaval that they have to go through. Ive already been in sessions where we start to see the breakdowns of how that works, but some of it also depends on the situation as they unfold. So i can not say compared to last time that weve become to that possibility. Yeah, on the reauthorization deadline, i wanted to ask, you mentioned it could be with an effective tax holiday. Passengers are paying taxes when they buy an airline ticket. What would happen with that money . Could the airlines pocket it, or would there be any way for d. O. T. Or congress to potentially claw that money back if we do get into a situation over the weekend where the reauthorization lapses . You know, anecdoteally, ive heard of scenario withs where airlines have found a way to adjust their fares accordingly. Some of that might be unrecoverable absent some other act of congress. And this jams up the ability to, again, make investments. Yesterday i was on runway 17 in denver where were funding improvements in this terms of the taxiway that will help avoid incursions into an approach zone and lighting. These are bread and butter things that we need to get done, and you add a to that the need to continue progress on the system of modernization, the nodem outage this in january of this year showed us even an hour and a half ground stop is halve havoc havoc all day for the system. It becomes harder and harder to prevent that. Have you been in touch with anyone about specifically whether that might be decouple from the shutdown, a situation where we get a shutdown but we dont get a lapse, for example maniesome. There are definitely a lot of different scenarios were talking about with folks on the hill including some that would allow some kind of extension and the approach that we discussed last night is one that has a different timeline for the extent than it does for the c. R. Were trying to be ready and to adapt to whatever congress flows our way, but this is no way to run a ball club. We should have, we shouldnt be in this situation to begin with, and if we are, we really want to have weeks into months to be able to game with out the details. Obviously, our professionals will do whatever it takes, but getting this close down to the wire is a real challenge for us. So in the last shutdown, you saw absenteeism at the tsa and faa creep. Is that the understandable at a point, or is your expectation that people are just going to have to bear the pain and keep coming to work as expected . Well, again, our people are pros, they come in, they do whats require of them. But theyre also human beings, and the pressure that theyre under grows and mounts each passing day that youre in this scenario. And so the only thing that is even more certain than the harms of a shutdown is that those harms will compound each passing day we go into that. Thank you. So what, if anything, is the Biden Administration doing to prepare and [inaudible] delays and cancellations at airports in case of a shutdown . Is so let me break it into the things that weve had underway and the things were trying to the make sure happen. Part of it is, that i think has really contributed to what you see here which is the cancellation rates below their prepandemic levels this year is that we have pressed airlines to run realistic schedules. That expectation continues. But the enforcement of that or anything else that we can hold airlines accountable to does get grunted if the office of aviation and Consumer Protection personnel are not able to come in to work. And that is what were looking at in a shutdown scenario. Theres not much we can do on rulemakinging, at least on that side of the house mt. Context of a shutdown. Again, the controllers still come in, the tsa possessor personnel still come in, but theyll be urn more is and more strain each day that this goes on. And even the accepted personnel excepted personnel, theyre going to keep coming in that day. Whether its controllers or other parts of the operation. Theyre part of a bigger ecosystem, right . Part of a bigger faa, d. O. T. , the more you have pieces of it that arent running, the more thats going to cause some kind of hiccups in their ability to smoothly and efficiently do their job. So were preparing the best we can even as we hope and expect that a shutdown will be avoided. But i cannot guarantee that this progress will continue if a shutdown like that takes place. And then again theres the training thing. I really want to emphasize this. Even a few days or weeks would is set us back well into next year in terms of what that does because of what it takes to train and qualify an air Traffic Controller e. Its not like one day, youre good to go, you can go anywhere. You have to train for the job and the geography that youre working. Not just ebbs experience, but recent experience matters. We biblely are in a place what finally are in a place where weve absorbed most of the ripple effects in the hole in our training only to have a potentially politicallydriven one come along. And the deep irony of this is that system of the same people who rushed to try to make it a partisan issue out of Airline Delays last year are behind the disruption or potential disruption year. [inaudible] would there be furloughses to the federal Railroad Administration . I was wondering if you could speak more to how that would impact their operation if they were shut down. Yeah. Again, the rulemaking activity might be unglamorous, but what were talking about is advancing very important rules. The effort to that trains have two or more crew members which takes a lot of work because of the complexity of the regulatory process. That would be interfered with at a time when i think everybody gets a 2, 3, 4mile train, we need to have adequate staffing on. Ill get you more details on the impact, but some of the other functions i think are very important would be interrupted. And then you get to the cuts. Remember, the whole premise of the shutdown is trying to force cuts that go deeper than what the president and the speaker agreed to. 11,000 fewer miles of track being inspect manied is inspected is, well, we estimate will be affected. And thats 8 . Let alone the one they voted, the c. R. With the 8 cut, let alone the one they actually vote for in april. So theres no way you can say youre about more Railroad Safety and then cut access or cut inspections that are helping to make shower that that safety sure that that safety is secured. All right. Well be in touch if you need more detailed numbers from the department, but thanks again for coming in. Appreciate it. Since 1979, in partnership with the cable industry, cspan has provide complete coverage of the halls of congress from the house and Senate Floors to congressional hearings, party briefings and committee meetings. Cspan gives you a front row seat to how issues are debate and decided with no commentary, no interruptions and complete ally unfiltered. Cspan, your unfiltered view of government. If you ever miss any of cspans coverage, you can find it anytime online at cspan. Org. Videos of key hearings, debates and other events feature markers that guide you to interesting and newsworthy highlights. These points of interest markers appear on the righthand side of your screen when you hit play on select videos. This timeline tool makes it easy to the get an idea of what was debated and decided in washington. Scroll through and spend a few minuteses on cspans points of interest. President biden join members of United Auto Workers union on the picket line in wayne county, michigan. The workers are in the 12th day of strikes demanding higher wages and Better Benefits from three awe auto companies, general motors, ford and stellantis. The president s visit happened one day before leading republican president ial candidate donald trump was expected to visit detroit. [inaudible conversations] [background sounds] [inaudible conversations]