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<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\nOn Wednesday I had the genuine pleasure of watching the Senate Commerce Committee\u2019s three-hour confirmation hearing for Sean Duffy (shown at left), the President-elect\u2019s nominate to be the next Secretary of Transportation. I say it was a \u201cgenuine pleasure\u201d not for any political reasons, but rather because (1) it was an opportunity to witness an important part of the democratic process, (2) learn many interesting things about transportation in the United States, and (3) get to know the man who will almost certainly be our boss for at least the next four years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Here are my key takeaways on those topics:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
THE HEARING<\/strong>: The Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee oversees transportation in our country, which is why it falls to them to vet nominees for DOT Secretary. This vetting is done, in part, during a confirmation hearing in the Senate\u2019s Russell Office Building on Capitol Hill. Prior to the meeting, Senators had the opportunity to meet with Mr. Duffy one-on-one, to get to know the man. During the hearing, many Senators on the committee asked Mr. Duffy questions about his transportation experience, and views on a wide array of transportation issues affecting the United States. The hearing was an enjoyable and educational overview of the modes of transportation in this country and the issues affecting them. It gave me a much broader perspective about DOTs mission, and the FAA\u2019s role in it. Aviation-related topics that came up focused on Boeing, Advanced Air Mobility (AAM), drones, air traffic controllers, pilot training, Essential Air Service, and rocket launches.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Speaking of rockets, the committee chairman shared that he recently attended the launch of a SpaceX Starship. He described it as \u201cawe-inspiring\u201d to see a \u201c22-story \u2018Statue of Liberty\u2019 blasting into the skies.\u201d His words painted a vivid picture that made an impression on me. But they also reminded me that he is just as human as I am. And watching the hearing truly humanized the Senators. I suspect that many of us have narrow, polarized views of our Members of Congress. So, it was reassuring to see the committee\u2019s leaders (from opposing parties) interacting warmly and with collegial humor. It\u2019s clear that they are not just colleagues, but also friends. And despite their admitted differences they all want our country to thrive. Yet it often feels like Congress is never able to agree on what\u2019s best for the United States. So, I found it incredibly funny when, at one point in the hearing, the chairman noted that \u201cI think we can all agree that death is bad.\u201d (He sounded (fairly) confident that his fellow Senators would agree on this point.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n THE NOMINEE:<\/strong> Sean Duffy is a 53-year-old former district attorney from Wisconsin. He served as one of that state\u2019s Congressmen from 2011 \u2013 2019. He and his wife Rachel have been married for 25 years, and they met on a reality TV show. They have nine children. The youngest is five. The eldest is married and recently became a parent. That makes Mr. Duffy a very youthful looking grandfather! (See my attached montage.)\u00a0 Almost all his children were present at the hearing, and they were well behaved. But, as one senator teasingly observed at the two-hour mark, he feared that he and his colleagues were \u201cboring the younger Duffy children to death.\u201d It was then that I noticed one of the youngest had fallen asleep with her head on the shoulder of her slightly older brother. It was adorable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mr. Duffy retired from Congress five years ago, when his youngest daughter, Valentina, was born with Down Syndrome. Her \u201cjoy and marvel at all things\u201d has helped to make her the family\u2019s favorite child. She was also the darling of the Senators and could easily have stolen the show. It seems that five-year-old Valentina is non-partisan and a wonderful ambassador for her father. (For example, prior to the hearing she insisted on getting repeated hugs from a motherly Democratic Senator she had just met.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mr. Duffy expressed his hope of ushering in what he calls a \u201cgolden age for transportation.\u201d But although he is clearly passionate about the topic, he also has a healthy sense of humor. Early in the hearing he jokingly noted that, as the father of nine children, transportation is a topic that is often on his mind!<\/p>\n\n\n\n He\u2019s easy to like. Here are a few adjectives that came to mind during the three hours that I watched him interact with the senators: Youthful, Energetic, Honest, Transparent, Charismatic, Eager, Humble, Sincere. He was not afraid to say \u201cSenator, I don\u2019t know the answer to your question, but I\u2019ll get back to you.\u201d Nor was he afraid to tell individual senators that he didn\u2019t necessarily agree with them on issues that are close to their hearts. In short, it seems he will make decisions based on what he, not the politicians, think are best for this country. Nevertheless, as one senator noted, Mr. Duffy is \u201ca strong consensus builder, as evidenced from his time in Congress.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n THE UNANSWERED QUESTION<\/strong>: Admittedly, I knew next to nothing about Mr. Duffy prior to the hearing. Afterwards, a more knowledgeable friend shared that Mr. Duffy doesn\u2019t have much experience with transportation issues, nor with overseeing large organizations. In retrospect, it is quite noteworthy that neither of those points were expressly addressed during the hearing. But my sense is that the reason Mr. Duffy seemed to receive bipartisan support is because, at least in part, he seems to be an energetic and adaptable go-getter who is good with people and can build consensus. And that brings to mind a somewhat different kind of person: Industrialist Andrew Carnegie was one of 19th century America\u2019s wealthiest citizens. He was a self-made man and reportedly achieved success by, as he said, \u201csurround[ing] himself with men far cleverer than himself.\u201d My point is that sometimes a great leader doesn\u2019t need to be a subject matter expert, so long as he knows how to surround himself with, and lead, people who have what he lacks. Let\u2019s hope that Sean Duffy is like that, or, if confirmed, finds some other way to grow into a Transportation Secretary who will accomplish good things for our country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The full Senate will likely vote on Mr. Duffy\u2019s nomination later this month. In all likelihood he will be our next Secretary of Transportation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n These are the personal views of Michael J. Schoen. He covers events regardless of their political affiliation, and strives to be non-partisan in his reporting. He<\/em> is an occasional contributor to the State Aviation Journal<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By Michael J. Schoen, Esq. On Wednesday I had the genuine pleasure of watching the Senate Commerce Committee\u2019s three-hour confirmation hearing for Sean Duffy (shown at left), the President-elect\u2019s nominate to be the next Secretary of Transportation. I say it was a \u201cgenuine pleasure\u201d not for any political reasons, but rather because (1) it was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[161,115],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30642","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-commentary","category-national-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30642","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30642"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30642\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30646,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30642\/revisions\/30646"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30642"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30642"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30642"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}