Womack Remarks at Budget Hearing on Department of Transportation

Today, we welcome the Honorable Sean Duffy, Secretary of the Department of Transportation, to testify on the Fiscal Year 2027 budget. Thank you, Secretary Duffy, for appearing before us today. 

The President’s request for DOT is $26.8 billion in discretionary budget authority for fiscal year 2027. This amount includes an increase for air traffic operations to continue efforts to hire controllers and other safety personnel, another installment for air traffic modernization, and new investments in ports, shipyards, and rail safety.

This is the first year without advance appropriations from the IIJA, which totaled $184 billion for DOT from 2022 to 2026. I appreciate the efforts of your department to move things forward. Since you were in front of this subcommittee last year, the obligation rate of IIJA Division J dollars has increased from 39 percent to 51 percent.

In the past year, the backlog of 3,200 grants has been nearly eliminated. We appreciate that effort and would remind you of the requirements set forth in the FY26 law regarding proper execution of programs appropriated by this Committee, along with new Congressional notification requirements.

Our hearing today serves as an example of the reciprocal relationship between this Committee and the Executive Branch to ensure the appropriate resources are provided to DOT to meet our shared goals of safety, infrastructure improvements, and modernization of our transportation systems. 

The investments we have made together in air traffic control prove this concept. Funding to rebuild the controller workforce combined with long-overdue modernization of air traffic technologies reflects the kind of sustained, bipartisan commitment that a safety-critical mission demands. 

The work is far from finished, and the challenges ahead are significant. The progress we have made shows what’s possible when Congress and DOT focus on common priorities and follow through with real resources.

As we look forward to FY27, we know more needs to be done. For the seas, we need to ramp up our investments in the nation’s maritime workforce and infrastructure to ensure we have the commercial competency to compete globally. This will also support our national defense capability in INDOPACOM and elsewhere. 

For our surface transportation infrastructure, we are on the precipice of a reset following the expiration of the IIJA. How we build upon what worked, and how we course correct from those investments that were serving political pipedreams is the key question ahead for Fiscal Year 2027. 

I look forward to seeing what our authorizing counterparts put forward, and we stand at the ready on the Appropriations Committee to “cut-the-check” when the time comes. I should be clear, however, that this Committee has the sole jurisdiction on discretionary funding. Efforts to recreate the advance appropriations of the IIJA are ill-founded and are not to be contemplated without the full involvement and deliberation of the Appropriations Committee.

The invite remains, Mr. Secretary, to come down to Arkansas’ Third District and see how the investments of your department are flowing into communities like mine. DOT is a unique department in that way, as the impact of your work is seen in every single Congressional District. 

As such, we have a history of bipartisanship that I look forward to continuing as we begin the FY27 process. Speaking of which, I’d now like to recognize the Ranking Member from South Carolina, Mr. Clyburn, for his opening statement.