The following is a transcript of my monologue on today’s edition of Counter Points.
Today the Senate is holding a hearing on railway safety as a bipartisan group of lawmakers pushes for a bill intended to prevent future derailments like the one in East Palestine, Ohio. To put it bluntly, you’d have to be an industry expert to thoroughly evaluate the merits of this legislation, which is sponsored by Republican Sens. J.D. Vance, Marco Rubio, and Josh Hawley, along with Democratic Sens. Sherrod Brown, John Fetterman, and Bob Casey. It’s deep in the weeds.
Such experts are few and far between in the news media and even in Congress. That’s where lobbyists and unions step in to fill those knowledge gaps. Who do we trust to learn from East Palestine and spare other communities the same fate?
No rail system will ever be 100 percent safe. Transportation of hazardous chemicals will never be without risk. We have to do both, so we have to accept some of that risk and accept we can never fully eliminate it.
The question, then, is whether the risk right now is too high. If so, what would bring it down?
The industry’s latest data finds that, “For all railroads, the derailment rate is down 31% since 2000, but despite that longer-term positive trend, it was up by 5% year-over-year.” A fact sheet being circulated by Ohio Republican Sen. J.D. Vance’s office contends, “Derailments in the United States are much more common than in other
