leading champions in the senate the last time we authorized passage rail it was trent lott republican from mississippi, and a democrat from new jersey. so it can be a bipartisan issue. in fact, tomorrow the senate will introduce its rail authorization act, and once again, it s a mississippi-new jersey connection. a conservative republican from mississippi, and cory booker a liberal democrat from new jersey. but they each see a different face of passage rail for the people they serve and they have have worked together on a bill that i am optimistic will be a more positive bill for passage rail. you mentioned meridian mississippi, and the need to connect that to the broader train network. some folks say too much attention and money has been spread around the country, and the resources should really be focused on smaller intercity routes and specifically the northeast corridor. because of the fact that amtrak
needs to be connected to that system. so in spite of gross underinvestment, amtrak has continued to serve the nation. keep in mind that there is no transportation system in the world that pays for itself out of its fare box. no rail system no highway system does nor does our airway system. think of all the investment in air traffic controllers, airports runways, tsa agents. we don t think about that as an investment in air, yet it is. and we invest precious little in passage rail. and we definitely need that passage rail connection to connect our economies, large cities small cities international networks. i think it bears mentioning that you were a republican mayor in mississippi for 16 years. what do you say to members of your own party who have expressed a great deal of skepticism over whether we need to fund amtrak? well if you look at the two
are many people of all hues who want america to turn america to get better. there are some who are holding fast to old traditions. you know, this reminds me actually of the sorry you talk about the late 60s, 1969 schools in mississippi were integrated. that s when i started first grade. i was in a lunch line outside meridian mississippi, northeast elementary school in meridian mississippi. my friends had dirt floors in some of the corridors and they think i m telling stories about living in a log cabin. but i remember a young white kid saying something very racist in line. and a young teacher, maybe she was 23 24 young white teacher actually grabbing him by his ear and dragging him to the office in front of us kicking and screaming. and i ve always looked back on that moment. i rarely i think i maybe told it one time. but that taught me when i was 5, 6 years old, okay, wait this is not acceptable behavior.
and i think we all were taught that, but unfortunately there are still some pockets of racism today. i think it s important we also be fair in this context. i was born in the north like willie. it happened in the north. i led marches in brooklyn where i heard the n word i m talking about in the 90s where we had in benson. it was actually i was stabbed leading a non-violent march. every morning i get up i look at a scar on my chest while i m shaving where i was almost killed leading a march in brooklyn. i m not talking about mississippi. so it s not regional. and i think the telling point is that every march we had, there were whites that marched with us and there were blacks that were going on tv denouncing us saying we were causing trouble. this kid in oklahoma said we were taught this we need to see