I really can’t help myself when it comes to writing about the California High-Speed Rail Authority. Through the past 16 years, I’ve written more than three dozen columns, criticizing the authority. It amazes me that the people who sit on the Board manage to get their shoes on the correct feet each morning. Early last year, the CAHSRA lost $4 billion in federal funding. That’s $4 BILLION! How’d they do that?
Reporting for CBS News, Julie Watts writes, “California’s High-Speed Rail Authority repeatedly missed key deadlines to buy its trains, a failure federal officials cited when they pulled $4 billion in funding…” And, almost unbelievably, the authority still cannot determine when it will be ready to award the contract for train sets. The thing about high-speed trains is that they are not sitting in store windows. You can’t walk in, write a check, and walk out with the item in a shopping bag.
The train sets must be built to specifications, and that takes time. According to another CBS News release, the CAHSRA said that it takes about four years from the initiation of a contract to the delivery of a completed trainset. In 2023, the CAHSRA stated that it would receive two train sets in 2028 and another four in 2030. Apparently, that’s now a pipe dream. According to Watts, “The state says that the date remains ‘TBD.’”
Four-year clock
CBS California Investigates found that it was “critical” that the authority contract with a manufacturer “both for the federal grants and the overall timeline.” In August, 2023, then-Board Chair Tom Richards said, “Our action today allows us to deliver on our commitment to meet our federal grant timelines to start testing.” However, records indicate that no contract was negotiated with any train manufacturer.
By November, 2024, CBS California Investigates reported, “The state has not publicly acknowledged the missed milestones, but multiple sources inside High Speed Rail blame the delay on decisions made by the CEO.” According to internal records, soon after taking office in 2024, CAHSRA’s new CEO Ian Choudri “decided to change the trainset specifications….” At the time, “the authority had already narrowed the field to two finalists and was in an active procurement phase to purchase the trains.”
Choudri didn’t care for the “wide-bodied” design of the trains, and wanted something “different.” That meant that existing agreements had to be cancelled, and the process would have to start over. As Board Member Ernest Camacho told the press, “We may have to cancel the procurement and rewrite new specifications.” According to CBS California Investigates, “Weeks later, the deadline passed with no train contract.”
In 2025, there had still been no contract for the trainsets. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said, “Federal dollars are not a blank check — they come with a promise to deliver results.” So, in July, 2025, the Trump Administration pulled the four-billion-dollar federal grant, citing the absence of a contract for train sets and the state’s failure to lay any tracks “after spending $15 billion over sixteen years.”
CBS California Investigates reports, “Gov. Gavin Newsom called the federal withdrawal of funding a ‘political stunt to punish California,’ and state Attorney General Rob Bonta promptly sued to stop “Trump’s politically motivated attack on high-speed rail.” But you know politics. A couple of months later, that law suit was dropped, and no explanation was given either by the state or the CAHSRA. But, according to CBS, the rail authority said that it hopes “to work with the federal government sometime in the future,” stating that the current administration in Washington, D.C., is “not a reliable partner.”
Laying tracks?
In January, 2026, Governor Newsom boasted about the progress made by the CAHSRA. He announced, “California is finally laying the tracks for the nation’s first high-speed rail system.” That statement reminded me of a movie scene that seems totally unrelated to the topic I’ve been covering. I’m thinking about Forrest Gump. At the beginning of the film, a doctor is fitting young Forrest with leg braces. The doctor tells Forrest’s mother, “His legs are strong, as strong as I’ve even seen. But his back’s as crooked as a politician.”
In fact, the state had not set down a single high-speed rail track. According to CBS California Investigates, “What the state had built was a railhead — a logistics depot designed to receive, store, and stage the rail that crews would eventually install.” And, in fact, the railhead itself hadn’t been completed. A few weeks later, the state announced that the railhead had been built, and it would now allow “California to begin receiving and staging materials needed to install high-speed rail track.” But then High-Speed Rail Inspector General Ben Belnap had to qualify even that statement. According to CBS California Investigates, “There’s been a railyard created that has track on it, but it is not high-speed rail.”
In 2008 (18 years ago) California voters authorized the sale of nearly $10 billion in bonds to fund the construction of a high-speed rail line from S.F. to L.A. In 2010 (16 years ago), ground was broken for the project. In 2026 (now), we have some modern Stonehenge-type structures protruding from the ground in various places between Madera and Shafter. We have a plan to run a very expensive “bullet train” from Merced to Bakersfield, someday. And has anyone asked, “Who the H, E, double hockey sticks is going to ride that train?”
The current estimate to complete the entire project from S.F. to L.A. is now about $126 billion. The CAHSRA has spent about $15 billion so far. Now, the question is, “Should Californians spend another $111 billion to complete a project when it is having difficulty coming up with the money to complete the line from Madera to Shafter?” And, the fact is that the estimates for the project increase every year. Also, we know that the CAHSRA has a history of not meeting deadlines. Unless our trillionaire and a few of his hundred-millionaire buddies decide to shake a couple of hundred million dollars loose, even your grandchildren may not see the bullet train accomplishing its 2008 goal.
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Jim Glynn is Professor Emeritus of Sociology. He may be contacted at j_glynn@att.net.