| | | | | |  | | By Irie Sentner | Presented by Capital Access Alliance | With help from Tanya Snyder and James Bikales
| | — The Titan tragedy could be part of the calculus as Congress and the FAA contemplate redrawing commercial spaceflight regs. — Last week’s travel nightmare continued into the July 4 weekend, with Saturday and Sunday each seeing nearly 8,000 delayed flights, according to FlightAware. — An investigation into decades of sexual assault and violence at the Coast Guard Academy wasn't disclosed to the Senate until last week, following inquiries by CNN. IT’S WEDNESDAY: You’re reading Morning Transportation, your Washington policy guide to everything that moves. Send tips, thoughts, song lyrics and recipes you like to adaugherty@politico.com, tsnyder@politico.com and isentner@politico.com. Find us on Twitter @alextdaugherty, @TSnyderDC and @iriesentner. "Country roads, take me home / To the place I belong / West Virginia, mountain mama / Take me home, country roads."
| | | | A message from Capital Access Alliance: As bipartisan efforts to make air travel more affordable and efficient move through Congress, a misinformation campaign by a United Airlines-backed coalition seeks to limit choices and increase costs at Reagan National Airport (DCA). The false claims are about obstructing competition in the D.C. marketplace and have nothing to do with capacity at DCA. Here's the FAA's own data exposing their falsehoods. Learn more. | | | | | GOOD LUCK OUT THERE: Tourists are paying hundreds of thousands of dollars a pop for a ride on a novel technology into a dark frontier. If that sounds like it describes the Titan, an essentially unregulated, experimental submersible in which five people perished off the Canadian coast last month, you'd be right. But it could just as easily describe a tourism trip into orbit. — Like the Titan, commercial spaceflight is lightly regulated — by the FAA in the case of spacecraft, with authorities extending only to launch sites and to ensuring the safety of other air traffic. So what happens when something goes wrong in space? The short answer is: Nobody really knows. And unlike the Titan, there aren’t Coast Guard submersibles and Navy warships nearby to conduct a search, much less a rescue. “There is nothing in place at NASA, SpaceX, or any other company for the rescue of spaceflight participants,” Rep. Eric Sorensen (D-Ill.), ranking member of the House Space and Aeronautics Subcommittee, said in a statement. “We need to be careful about how we move forward,” he added. — The current regulatory regime — light on rules, heavy on innovation — was enacted in 2004, when tours into orbit were still on the distant horizon. Now that calculus has shifted, with a handful of outfits ready to launch civilians into space. That regime is set to expire on Oct. 1 if Congress doesn’t act. And experts say the Titan tragedy could be part of the calculus as lawmakers contemplate what, if anything, should replace it. — Mark J. Sundahl, head of Cleveland State University’s Global Space Law Center, said it’s “absolutely fair” to compare Titan to commercial spaceflight. Josef Koller, co-founder of the FFRDC Aerospace Corporation's Space Safety Institute, said: “I anticipate that this recent tragedy will actually facilitate some of those discussions and provide a bit more urgency.” — The FAA is “taking preparatory action now to develop a safety framework for commercial human spaceflight” ahead of the Oct. 1 sunset date, the agency said in a statement, including establishing an aerospace rulemaking committee and developing international consensus standards. The House Space and Aeronautics Subcommittee will hold a hearing on commercial spaceflight in the first half of July, according to subcommittee spokesperson Bridget Dunn.
| | | | JOIN 7/11 FOR A TALK ON THE FAA’S FUTURE: Congress is making moves to pass the FAA Reauthorization Act, laying the groundwork for the FAA’s long-term agenda to modernize the aviation sector to meet the challenges of today and innovate for tomorrow. Join POLITICO on July 11 to discuss what will make it into the final reauthorization bill and examine how reauthorization will reshape FAA’s priorities and authorities. REGISTER HERE. | | | | | Want to receive this newsletter every weekday? Subscribe to POLITICO Pro. You’ll also receive daily policy news and other intelligence you need to act on the day’s biggest stories.
| | ‘PACK SOME PATIENCE’: Coming off a week of delays, expectations were low heading into the July 4 holiday weekend. “Pack some patience,” TSA Administrator David Pekoske warned in a tweet Thursday. Frustrations increased Friday when United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby apologized for taking a private jet the same day his airline canceled hundreds of flights. — After TSA screened a record-high number of passengers Friday, the misery continued over the weekend, with Saturday and Sunday each seeing nearly 8,000 flights delayed across the country, according to FlightAware. Airports in the New York area were hit hardest. Delays and cancellations seemed to even out Monday, which had just over 1,500 delays. — Executives at JetBlue and United pointed blame at the FAA’s air traffic control shortage. But Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg rebuffed that criticism on Sunday, telling CBS News' "Face the Nation" that ATC staffing shortages account for “less than 10 percent of the delay minutes.” Still, he said the agency would hire 1,500 air traffic controllers this year and 1,800 next year and update its staffing models. COME AND GONE: The FAA's 5G deadline passed smoothly Saturday, despite concerns over delays from airlines without updated altimeters. RULE UPHELD: A federal appeals court upheld a rule that adopted aircraft climate emissions standards issued by ICAO, Alex Guillén reports. Environmentalists and blue states challenged the rule — Reg. 2060-AT26, enacted in 2020 under President Donald Trump and defended in court by the Biden administration — saying the EPA should have adopted a more stringent standard. EPA said it is reviewing the decision, and environmentalists blasted the ruling.
| | | | A message from Capital Access Alliance:   | | | | | BIDEN TAPS SPERLING: President Joe Biden tapped longtime Democratic adviser Gene Sperling to help smooth the upcoming labor contract talks between the UAW and Big Three automakers, a White House official confirmed Monday. Tanya, Zack Colman and Holly Otterbein have the story. — Sperling, an economic power player and longtime manufacturing advocate, could be in a position to win over a union that is openly skeptical about the White House’s push for electric vehicles. The effort could also shore up support for the president in Michigan — the state where Sperling was born and which played a crucial role in Biden’s election in 2020. — UAW’s collective bargaining agreement with Detroit’s major car companies ends Sept. 14. Should the talks turn acrimonious, a strike could damage the economy and give Republicans fresh ammunition in the 2024 campaign.
| | ‘OPERATION FOULED ANCHOR’: A yearslong U.S. Coast Guard investigation into decades of sexual assault and violence at the Coast Guard Academy went undisclosed to the Senate Commerce Committee until last week following inquiries into the probe by CNN, Irie reports. — In a letter sent Friday to the Coast Guard's commandant, Adm. Linda L. Fagan, Senate Commerce Chair Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) and Senate Oceans, Fisheries, Climate Change and Manufacturing Subcommittee Chair Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) pushed the agency to provide the committee with all documentation related to the probe and answers to a list of questions by July 14. The information will help the committee investigate whether the Coast Guard “complied with the law and to inform potential legislative action,” the letter says. — In the 2014-to-2020 inquiry, dubbed “Operation Fouled Anchor,” the Coast Guard identified 62 substantiated episodes of rape, sexual assault and sexual harassment at the academy or by its cadets between 1988 and 2006, according to the letter. It also identified 42 people against whom there might have been substantiated claims of rape, sexual assault and sexual harassment, yet the agency “neglected to pursue disciplinary measures” against “most” of them, the letter said. "The Coast Guard fully recognizes that, by not having taken appropriate action at the time of the sexual assaults, the Coast Guard may have further traumatized the victims, delayed access to their care and recovery, and prevented some cases from being referred to the military justice system for appropriate accountability," a Coast Guard spokesperson said in a statement to POLITICO. "The Coast Guard owns this failure and apologizes to each of the victims and their loved ones." ‘WHO ARE YOU TRYING TO HELP?’: Buttigieg slammed Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Sunday for a campaign video the GOP presidential hopeful released attacking former President Donald Trump for vowing to protect LGBTQ rights, Kelly Garrity reports. “I’m going to leave aside the strangeness of trying to prove your manhood by putting up a video that splices images of you in between oiled-up, shirtless bodybuilders, and just get to the bigger issue that is on my mind whenever I see this stuff in the policy space, which is, again, who are you trying to help?” Buttigieg said during an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union.” WHERE'S PETE?: Buttigieg is heading to Washington state to tout infrastructure projects and rub elbows with congressional heavy-hitters. On Thursday he'll tour a ferry modernization project and visit Port Orchard, where he'll speak at a press conference with Gov. Jay Inslee, Sens. Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell and Rep. Derek Kilmer (all D-Wash). He and Cantwell will meet up for another press conference Friday with Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp-Perez and local leaders.
| | | | PLUGGING IN TO BIDEN’S EV AGENDA: Biden has $7.5 billion in hand to build a national network of electric vehicle chargers that can support the mass adoption of EVs that he hopes to spur. The rub? That could be as little as a 10th of what’s required, even by his own administration’s estimates, James Bikales reports. — The Biden administration’s bold strategy on EV charging seeks to fill in the most glaring charging holes while marshaling states and the private sector to do the rest. But that will be no easy task. Gabe Klein, executive director of the newly formed Joint Office of Energy and Transportation, who is in charge of doling out the funds, is contending with supply chain constraints, pushback from GOP-led states and an evolving private sector — all while mass adoption of EVs appears to be at an inflection point. Americans bought nearly a million EVs last year, but a recent report found more than half of those who declined to buy one cited charging availability as the primary reason.
| | | | STEP INSIDE THE WEST WING: What's really happening in West Wing offices? Find out who's up, who's down, and who really has the president’s ear in our West Wing Playbook newsletter, the insider's guide to the Biden White House and Cabinet. For buzzy nuggets and details that you won't find anywhere else, subscribe today. | | | | | | | | | — “China Far Outranks the U.S in High-Speed Rail. Here’s Why.” The Wall Street Journal. — “Why It’s Impossible to Get Your Car Repaired This Summer.” The Wall Street Journal. — “Florida moves forward on radioactive road paving plan as Gov. DeSantis signs new law.” NPR. — “Michael Horodniceanu, Who Oversaw Transit Megaprojects, Dies at 78.” The New York Times. — “San Francisco may soon get 24/7 driverless cabs. City leaders are fuming.” The Washington Post. — “Lithium Scarcity Pushes Carmakers Into the Mining Business.” The New York Times. — “The wait for US passports is creating travel purgatory and snarling summer plans.” AP. — “Truckers flooded the market during Covid. Now they struggle to pay their bills.” NBC News. — “Why Car Repairs Have Become So Expensive.” The New York Times.
| | | | A message from Capital Access Alliance: An analysis of data from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) shows that DCA has the capacity to add more flights, which completely contradicts false claims made by a United and Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority (MWAA)-backed coalition.
FAA data shows that more than 28 flights can be added during three low-volume time blocks, every day at DCA.
The Direct Capital Access Act (H.R. 3185 & S. 1933) would authorize more direct flights at DCA, which is the only airport in the country limited by a federally-imposed "perimeter rule." More flights means more choices, more competition and lower fares for travelers.
FAA data confirms: Now is the time to expand access and affordability at DCA. Learn more. | | | | | | | Follow us on Twitter | | | | Follow us | | | | |
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