California Gov. Gavin Newsom has been frantically trying to restart a presidential campaign that appears moribund, with polls showing him losing in some states to figures such as Pete Buttigieg and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. In his absence, his multibillion-dollar high-speed train also seems to be going nowhere fast. A new report from the state inspector general revealed that the train will be delayed again and that the public is being kept in the dark about ongoing problems with Newsom’s signature project. Oh, and one more thing: the project will run out of money by December 2027.
Benjamin Belnap’s report revealed the project is again running out of money. Missing details in the project’s 2026 business plan, and concluded that the project will again be out of money by next year.
The state has already spent $18 billion, but it will need at least another $ 18 billion to finish the first segment. It could take roughly $200 billion more actually to complete the original San Francisco-to-Los Angeles line.
Even with billions more, the current segment will not be completed until 2034.
Voters approved a $9.95 billion bond issue in 2008 under Newsom’s predecessor after absurdly low cost estimates. Newsom has been a champion of the project. Influential figures and companies stood to make a fortune, and the key was to secure a “buy-in” worth billions, so that it would become increasingly difficult to abandon the project as overruns and delays sent costs soaring.
Now the official estimate of future ridership has dropped by 25%, and it demands billions more to complete a project delayed by decades. Remember that this entire project was meant to create a rail line of only 171 miles.
One would think that the California voters would be marching to the capital with pitchforks and torches over such breathtaking incompetence and waste. However, they appear to have been conditioned to accept the lowest level of performance from their public officials.
The response of Democratic leaders is crushingly predictable: they are pledging to seek a federal bailout to cover their own incompetence. The Democratic nominee for governor, Xavier Becerra, is promising to fight to get back federal funds that were cut off by the Trump Administration. While promising to seriously review any problems in the project (as if they are not obvious), no one has been held accountable for this financial train wreck. Instead, all Democrats can do is demand that citizens around the country help bail out their boondoogle.
Yet, the Inspector General is describing a failure of leadership where no one is making any real decisions:
“Exploration of specific financing mechanisms is a positive step, but because the Authority might run out of funding as soon as December 2027, and the financing strategy the Authority uses has the potential to significantly affect the amount of interest it will need to repay, the Authority and state lawmakers have little time for delay in deciding upon a strategy and implementing it.”
Belknap indicated that those in control are simply shrugging off the problem, noting that “[b]ecause the Authority has thus far not demonstrated a willingness to establish and reinforce a process that ensures accuracy and transparency in project reporting, we have directed our report recommendations to the Board.”
In the meantime, the state will continue to creep along with a project that is sucking billions into a project that has become a national disgrace. Beccera’s pledge to seek bailouts shows that the problem remains the political culture in California. There is little accountability left in a one-party state where companies and individuals have made fortunes off this debacle. The only people being taken for a ride are Californian citizens and it is not the ride that they bargained for.
Jonathan Turley is a law professor and the best-selling author of “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.”
It’s painfully obvious that State govt. in California is not running a meritocracy. The complete lack of accountability is the crux of the problem, as Steve Hilton is pointing out. I remember a time around the mid-2000s when “measurable results” was the standard for public investments. Now, it’s slipped backwards into “good intentions only” — and that is a consequence factional identity politics. You don’t hold your side accountable because it will be used by the opposition to crucify and weaken your side’s leadership.
Getting back to good government means citizens not taking up partisan identities, but rather straddling the two party system as uncommitted or independent. That way, both parties have to compete for your approval, neither takes you for granted, and neither writes you off you as unreachable.
pbinca, I think you’re hitting the real problem. Once partisan identity becomes more important than measurable results, accountability is dead. If I excuse failure because admitting it might help the other side, what incentive does my side ever have to improve?
My Deming training tells me that checks and balances, good intentions, and procedures aren’t enough. Plan, Do, Check, Act. Set measurable expectations, do the work, independently audit whether the system actually performed as intended, then act on what you learn. An audit isn’t an accusation of wrongdoing. It’s how a well-managed system produces justified trust. Government should have to earn that trust regardless of which party is running it.
It was already a sick joke when the high-speed rail from LA to SF would in fact only go from Bakersfield to Merced in its “first” phase, as if it would get any ridership at all – much less the ridership to pay for its own operations – between those two busy metropolises.
BUT NOW, to save money (that is, to reduce the INCREASE in cost from their 2025 estimate just last year) it isn’t even going from Bakersfield to Merced – it’s going from a “temporary” station north of Bakersfield to a station not in downtown Merced! I.e., a shorter distance, as well as not having to lay tracks into “town” and buy station property in “downtown”. N.B.: “Downtown” Bakersfield to “Downtown” Merced is in the (current) authorizing law, as is a distance of 171 miles – all three of those constraints would be violated by their new plan.
So now it’s even funnier, if you like to watch California burn $$$$ (which, in fact, I do because I fled California 25 years ago and positively don’t regret it).
Just for comparison Sound Transits Link Light Rail will (when complete in 2050) will cover 116 miles in and around Seattle for a estimated cost of 185 Billion.
This fraud had a price tag of $33 billion when the $9 billion bod was put on the ballot by Jerry Clown, errr Brown. Anyone with 100 or so working brain cells knew this was a fraud. Brown should be held responsible, much more than Gov Hair Gel.
Newsom and the one-party state legislature also caused the loss of tens of thousands of jobs in the fast food sector, and hundreds of restaurant closures, with raising the mandated wage. The employees lucky enough to keep their jobs had substantially fewer hours, while prices rose for the consumer. All that economic destruction for the sake of virtue signaling or being a member of a socialist cult. Now he wants to californicate the rest of the country. I say thanks but no thanks.
If the train project had been given to Trump or Musk at the beginning with means of keeping the grifters back it would have been finished long ago at a fraction of the cost.
Democrats roasted their own donors in the Palisades and still got reelected. Always expect the worst in blue counties.
Gov. Nuisance is far left, but now I hear he’s shifting left to keep up with “progressives.” Is that supposed to imply that Newsome is too moderate? Heaven help us.
Come On Man!! Newscum and Californication will NEVER run out of money! As long as Cali taxpayer FOOLS are in the State, have money in their pockets, and can be incarcerated for refusing to hand over the MOOLAH, then the Money Train just keeps chuggin! Bah haha. Can ya hear that Choo Choo comin for ya Cali?
The warmth of collectivism is caused by billions of taxpayer dollars going up in flames. In blue states people will vote for their own destruction.
Please, pistol Pete Hegseth spent $18bn last month in the pointless war on Iran. The Pentagon spends hundreds of billions every year on pointless nonsense ‘going up in flames’ (see e.g. Ukraine) and hasn’t passed an audit in 8years.
The Great Grift of America continues unabated and makes no distinction between ‘blue/red’ states. .. and will continue to do so until the ‘warmth of collectivism’ stop it.
*there are no blue states, there are no red states .. . there is only the United States.