AMAC Exclusive – By Louis J. Senn
Last week, for the first time since September 11, 2001, a ground stop was issued for all domestic flights in the United States due to a malfunction of FAA safety software. While the White House and mainstream media were quick to blame outdated technology, this travel nightmare was just the latest transportation-related fiasco to occur under the watch of Biden Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, raising fresh questions about the small-town mayor’s fitness for the job.
Looking back at Buttigieg’s record as a public official, it’s perhaps no surprise that the country has seen an inordinate number of transportation crises throughout his tenure. During Buttigieg’s time as mayor of South Bend, Indiana, the city’s pothole situation got so bad that one local newspaper flatly stated that “potholes around South Bend might be worst in recent memory.” When Buttigieg announced his 2020 presidential run, many South Bend residents slammed the mayor for failing to do much of anything to improve the city. “How is he gonna run the whole country if he can’t even get your city right first?” one resident remarked. Another said plainly, “I ain’t ever seen the dude.”
Many residents felt that Buttigieg had ignored basic infrastructure projects. The aforementioned pot hole situation eventually got so bad that Domino’s Pizza selected South Bend to be the recipient of its pothole repair grant – hardly a ringing endorsement of Buttigieg’s administration.
Apparently ignoring these obvious failures to run basic city services, President Biden moved forward with his nomination as Transportation Secretary, and Senate Democrats lined up to support his “historic” confirmation. Media outlets gushed about his education credentials and labeled him the “first openly gay cabinet secretary” (a distinction that in fact belongs to President Trump’s former Director of National Intelligence, Ric Grenell), while noticeably failing to make the case for why Buttigieg’s degree in history and literature, even from Harvard, qualifies him to run the Department of Transportation.
Once confirmed, Buttigieg’s first problem arose as reports started to surface in the summer of 2021 that a global shipping crisis was brewing. There were indications that delays would start to stack up after an almost 4,000% increase of ships waiting at ports of entry. These delays, experts warned as early as August 2021, would lead to higher prices as well as shortages of goods.
The supply chain crisis soon came to dominate headlines, leading to empty grocery store shelves and contributing to drastic price hikes for everything from clothes to lumber. But Buttigieg was nowhere to be found. Throughout the worst two months of the crisis, he was on paternity leave – he and his husband Chasten had just adopted twins.
To be sure, welcoming two children is a big change for anyone. But as Secretary of Transportation, Buttigieg had the entire country looking to him to alleviate the crisis. When he finally broke radio silence, he merely stated that it could take years for things to return to normal – in effect tossing up his hands in defeat. As Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) warned at the time, “Buttigieg couldn’t organize a one-car funeral. He’s not going to organize our nation’s ports and railroads and highways and airports.”
Since this initial crisis, Senator Cotton has been only further proven right. The second major debacle occurred during this past summer and fall when talks of striking began to surface among the railroad unions. With crushing inflation fueled by still-unresolved supply chain issues, many worried that a stoppage of the nation’s extensive and critical rail network would cause a complete economic meltdown.
By September, the administration secured a tentative deal with the labor union leaders, who then needed to obtain member approval. However, it was immediately clear that union members did not like what was being force-fed to them. With the White House locked in a stalemate, Congress was eventually forced to pass a deal which Biden signed into law in early December 2022.
Throughout these several weeks of tense negotiations, Buttigieg was once again missing in action – on vacation in Europe, to be exact. Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) eviscerated Buttigieg for his dereliction of duty, saying “Rail workers just wanted a few days of paid sick leave. President Biden told them to pound sand and his Transportation Secretary vacationed in wine country.”
Then, during the most recent holiday travel season, thousands of airline passengers found themselves stranded as Southwest Airlines experienced unprecedented cancellations due to a number of issues. Buttigieg finally appeared ready for action as he blasted Southwest’s CEO on December 29, writing, “The level of disruption Southwest customers have experienced over the Christmas holiday and into the New Year is unacceptable.”
But that statement would come back to haunt Buttigieg two weeks later as the FAA announced its extraordinary decision in the middle of “airline rush hour” to issue a ground stop on all domestic flights. The disruption was caused by a failure in a system called NOTAM.
The White House, elected Democrats, and the mainstream media were quick to point out that NOTAM and the computers it runs on are badly out of date, much like many other government systems. This indeed appears to be the case.
However, Buttigieg has been in office for nearly two years, and has had multiple opportunities for budget requests. But instead of upgrading this critical FAA system, Buttigieg has had another priority: infusing wokeness into every part of the Department of Transportation’s mission. For instance, a December 6, 2021, memo notified FAA employees that “NOTAM” would no longer stand for “Notice to Airmen” but rather “Air Mission” – thus removing supposedly “sexist” language from the acronym. The 2023 Federal Budget also provided the following insight into the priorities at the Biden Department of Transportation: “[the 2023 budget] will strengthen the Nation’s transportation system while tackling climate change…and advancing environmental justice.” Nowhere did it make any request for actually updating NOTAM.
Buttigieg’s only contribution to the Department of Transportation has seemingly been to play a sort of sociology professor pontificating about our racist highways and infrastructure. His FAA has repeatedly held training to ensure “diversity, equity, and inclusion” initiatives are met, but apparently made no preparations for the event of a massive systems outage.
As Nina Turner of Race, Power and Political Economy put it, “Secretary Buttigieg is a prime example of failing up.” From his time mismanaging South Bend’s infrastructure, to his history of ignoring racial problems in his own presidential campaign, to his husband complaining about their struggles affording housing in D.C. (on a cabinet secretary’s $220,000 annual salary), Buttigieg has been out of touch, tone deaf, and in over his head.
If Biden truly cares about serving the American people, he might start with holding Pete Buttigieg accountable for what has objectively been one of the most disastrous cabinet tenures in recent memory.
Louis J. Senn is a lawyer living in Louisville, Kentucky. He previously served in the Trump administration.
