Amtrak is criticizing proposals to privatize passenger rail service in the United States. The railroad published a white paper on the subject shortly after billionaire and presidential advisor Elon Musk said the government should privatize the national passenger carrier.
“If you go to China, you get epic bullet train rides. They’re amazing,” Musk said during a tech conference. “And you come back to America, and you’re like, ‘Amtrak is a sad situation.”
Amtrak began operations in 1971 after most private freight railroads in the country had given up operating passenger services.
It’s unclear how serious Musk is about finding a private operator for Amtrak. And while the staff of his Department of Government Efficiency, or “DOGE,” has been going through many federal agencies looking to cut costs, Amtrak is its own quasi-public corporation. Any effort to privatize the railroad would legally have to go through Congress.
Regardless, Amtrak appears to be taking the remarks seriously. In the six-page document, the passenger railroad noted that it has succeeded over the last half-century despite receiving what it called limited government funding. The railroad also noted that elsewhere in the world, most notably Great Britain, efforts to privatize passenger services have faltered (last year, Britain enacted legislation to end what was left of its franchise model and create a new government entity called “Great British Rail” to replace the private train operators).
The paper also noted that past efforts in Congress to privatize the railroad have failed. In 2008 and 2017, the FRA solicited bids to take over parts of the Amtrak network, but there were no takers. In 2016, a similar solicitation resulted in just one non-Amtrak proposal from China’s government-owned railroad. That proposal also called for government funding.
Presently, the only part of the Amtrak network that covers its operating costs is the Northeast Corridor between Washington D.C. and Boston. The remainder of the system (specifically the long-distance trains) relies on government funding.
Amtrak also noted that while Brightline West, the high-speed route being built between Los Angeles and Las Vegas, initially stated it would be constructed with private capital, it has since received $3 billion in government grants.
“It is not clear what proponents of Amtrak privatization expect it would accomplish,” Amtrak officials wrote. “A private entity would face the same constraints as Amtrak, but it would lack Amtrak’s essential statutory right to operate over the national rail network.” —Justin Franz
