Accentuating the rural in the Secretary of Transportation's job

A few weeks ago, Pete Buttigieg appeared before the Senate for hearings on his nomination to be the Biden administration's Secretary of Transportation, and yesterday he was confirmed for that role by a vote of 86-13.  This nomination and confirmation have been most discussed because Buttigieg is the first openly LGBTQ cabinet member in U.S. history--and that is pretty remarkable.   

Twitter thread on 
Senator Tester's 
comments re: Buttigieg 
nomination and
confirmation as
Secretary 
of Transportation

But there are ruralist reasons to focus on this nomination.  I think that when most people think of the Department of Transportation, they are thinking of airports and train stations--think of the film "planes, trains [but less] automobiles."  Most people are focused on transportation infrastructure that is visible to metropolitan folks--or to those driving across the country, e.g., interstate highways.  But transportation infrastructure is also critical to rural folks--especially roads and the links that rural folks enjoy to airports and rail.  Some representative stories are here and here.  

So I thought it was interesting that when Pete Buttigieg appeared on January 21, 2021 before the U.S. Senate, Jon Tester, the senior Senator from Montana, commented on what is at stake for rural residents when it comes to federal transportation policy.  

Here's a transcript of some of Tester's comments:

Your intellect has preceded you into the room. You have put on a clinic on how a nominee should work and act. You haven’t avoided the questions. You’ve been straightforward. And you know what the hell you’re talking about. And that’s really pretty damn refreshing. 

Infrastructure in rural America is as important as it is anywhere in the country. And making sure that rural America has access to the dollars, even though we don’t have as many people per square mile, is critically important – and let me give you an example: There’s a little highway that runs south of my farm. It’s about twenty miles long. It was built when I was in grade school and extended out when I was in high school. That little highway saves every farmer that lives out in my community, literally hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars every year. Why? Less flat tires, front ends aren’t knocked out of align, less wear and tear on vehicles so you can run ‘em longer. That is why we need to make sure rural America is taken care of.

This part at the end is just so practical, so concrete that I can hear my father saying it.  He was always fretting about whether we were optimally taking care of our vehicles so that their lives were preserved.  The cost of new tires, of re-aligning a front end ... these are meaningful expenses for many rural Americans.  May sound little small potatoes for city folks, but that just shows their disconnectedness from rural livelihoods and rural household budgets.  

So who voted against Buttigieg?  lots of senators from lots states with significant rural populations:  Cotton (R-AR); Rubio (R-FL); Hawley (R-MO); Cruz (R-TX); Cassidy (R-LA); Blackburn (R-TN); Shelby (R-AL): Tuberville (R-AL); Scott (R-SC); Marshall (R-KS); Scott (R-FL); and Hagerty (R-TN).  Of course, regardless of the amount of rural territory, surely all of these senators have the ability to see how an intelligent technocratic Secretary of Transportation can be a benefit to their states.