Kill the California high-speed-rail boondoggle? Katie Porter went there. Well, a little. The former U.S. House member and failed 2024 candidate for U.S. Senate now is running for governor in 2026. She has gone farther than any Democratic candidate to question the project, which she had strongly supported.
“Increasingly, the evidence is showing that this project is not going to be able to be completed remotely on budget or remotely on time,” she told KTLA. “That’s why I don’t think we should BS California voters. They have noticed that we don’t have a high-speed rail. And they have noticed we’ve spent money on it.”
Unfortunately, she didn’t outright call for an end to the project. Instead, she added, “If this high-speed rail project can get done, then let’s get it done. If it can’t get done, then stop.”
A week after saying that, she walked her criticism back further while at a labor event. According to Politico, she told a reporter she wants to “put people to work, and I want to get it done for Californians.”
Everybody knows it can’t get done. The project came into existence from the vapors at the end of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s undistinguished seven years in office. In 2008 he conned just 52.6% of voters to pass Proposition 1A.
Voters read this promise in the ballot summary: “Establishes a clean, efficient 220 MPH transportation system…. Provides for a bond issue of $9.95 billion to establish high-speed train service linking Southern California counties, the Sacramento/San Joaquin Valley, and the San Francisco Bay Area.”
Even if the $9.95 billion price tag and the train speed had been remotely realistic, the problem is right there in the words: linking SoCal to NorCal means the train would run through the lightly populated areas in between. And the easiest way to traverse that is not in a train taking at least 2.5 hours, probably a lot more, but on a plane at half that.
The California High-Speed Rail Authority’s Nov. 2008 Business Plan invoked as a model the “Shinkansen high-speed trains – Japan.” The territories are roughly similar, with Japan’s 145,937 square miles a bit less than California’s 163,696. But the population sizes are markedly different, Japan’s 123 million to California’s 39 million. That yields a population density of 842 per square miles for Japan, but just 238 for California – a bit more than a quarter as dense.
In 2007, just before Prop. 1A passed, the Department of Finance projected California’s population would grow from 36.6 million to nearly 60 million by 2050. Instead, the population leveled out at 39 million. The state’s endemic mismanagement, including under Arnold, finally took its toll. From 2000 to 2003, the population actually dropped.
In the private sector, families and businesses reassess plans when circumstances change. Not the government, whose motto ought to be: No boondoggle left unfunded.
The project’s original price tag was $33 billion, with $9.95 billion from the Prop. 1A bonds, the rest from federal or private sources. But the HSRA’s March 1, 2025 Project Update Report pegged the total cost now as high as $135 billion. Yet no part of the project has been finished, including the initial segment, Merced-to-Bakersfield, now projected to finish as late as 2033 – maybe.
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Porter needs to take a more antagonistic stance against Arnold’s Folly, including demanding Newsom and the Legislature remove that funding. With the state suffering a $12 billion deficit and Republican candidates Steve Hilton and Chad Bianco strongly calling for termination, the other Democratic candidates also need to defy the unions still pushing the project and come out sharply against it.
The June 2 primary next year will come as the Legislature grapples with Newsom’s final budget proposal. If there’s another deficit, as seems likely, candidates who spent the past year preaching frugality will fare better than those pushing profligacy.
John Seiler is on the Southern California News Group’s Editorial Board
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