The once-Golden State really needs better leadership. But then, that's been the case for decades now. It's bemusing to look back and remember that California elected Ronald Reagan as Governor, twice, and then twice sent its electoral votes to President Reagan in 1980 and 1984 - as well as to his successor, George H.W. Bush, in 1988. Ah, those were the days.
Those are the days no longer. The impeccably coiffed Gavin Newsom presides over California's ongoing decline and pending collapse now. Nowhere is that more obvious than in the disastrous failure of one of his key projects, the so-called California bullet train. Almost $14 billion - that's "billion," as in a "B" followed by an "illion" - has been spent on this massive boondoggle, and not one train has run, not one passenger has been moved even one foot, after over 10 years of development and construction. Now, it's running out of money.
California’s ambitious high-speed rail megaproject is facing a critical cash bottleneck and could run out of money by the end of 2027.
The California High-Speed Rail Authority’s Inspector General warned the project will run out of funding by as soon as the end of next year.
The estimated cost of the train project has ballooned to a staggering $231 billion, with completion now delayed until roughly 2039.
In an official letter sent to Governor Gavin Newsom and state legislative leaders reviewing the final 2026 Business Plan, Benjamin Belnap blasted the agency, saying it “has obscured basic facts about the project, hindering lawmakers’ ability to provide effective oversight”.
So, they have already sunk in $14 billion; note that this figure may well be even higher right now. And they are talking about a total of $231 billion? For a system, a train, that after ten years has not moved so much as a paper clip, but has moved a lot of California taxpayers' money out of the state coffers, pouring them into this boondoggle? That's inexcusable.
The situation is coming to a head now, though.
According to Inspector General Belnap’s report, the state agency faces a significant funding gap over the next five fiscal years. To keep ongoing construction on track for the initial Merced-to-Bakersfield segment, the project needs an immediate $2.2 billion in additional financing for fiscal year 2027–28 alone.
Beyond the cash flow bottleneck, the Authority has spent over $5.7 billion on delay and change-order fees, including $537 million paid to a single contractor in February.
Federal funding, which flowed freely under the Biden administration, has now been cut off; that's a thin silver lining, we can suppose. But there's no indication that Gavin Newsom intends to back down on this, no matter how much this whole thing begins to stink, and it's well past the "dead carp in the trunk of a car for two weeks in July in Alabama" stage of odoriferous offensiveness.
What's worse, California's own over-regulation of every possible business or infrastructure enterprise is at least in part to blame.
Rep. Kevin Kiley (R-Roseville) called the California high-speed rail project “the worst public infrastructure failure in U.S. history.”
“Thankfully, we have now cut off all further federal funding,” Kiley told The Post.
High-Speed Rail Authority CEO Ian Choudri spoke at a Fresno rotary club last week and pinned blame on California’s byzantine building rules for out-of-control costs and delays.
He seemed to particularly emphasize laws requiring environmental reviews, specifically the California Environmental Quality Act, for causing delays.
It's time to end this. Oh, Gavin Newsom won't give up easily. He's stubborn in this, a project that began before his tenure but which he seems to have made one of his key personal priorities. But for the luvva Pete, sometimes you've just got to know when to pack it in. As the famous W.C. Fields once said, "If at first you don't succeed, try, try again. Then quit. No point in being a d*mn fool about it." California is at that point with this high-speed rail that is so slow in its development; it's at the pouring good money after bad stage.
Local communities now seem to be taking the collapse for granted. The Central Valley community of Shafter, for example, has greenlighted a 1,200-unit housing development smack in the middle of the proposed bullet train's right-of-way.
California’s beleaguered, over-budget high-speed rail line now has one more thing to worry about: A city and housing developer wants to build homes right in the train’s projected path.
Shafter, a city near Bakersfield, and developer Lennar Homes are plowing ahead with 1,200 homes in the same area off Highway 99 where the state’s rail authority plans to build tracks.
This isn't Rock Ridge, and Gavin Newsom isn't Hedley Lamarr. This whole thing just isn't funny anymore. It's time that this railroad project ended. The taxpayers of California are taking a beating; the next Democrat administration will very likely open the taps of the federal treasury so that the entire country can take a beating, and many more years will pass without one passenger being moved from anywhere to anywhere, even as more billions of dollars disappear as though set ablaze.
Enough is enough, California. It's time to walk away from this debacle.
