... US rail carriers and the track involved. Philip Anschutz's a cheap bastard who wants to keep his rails up to a a bare minimum, less than what would be safe for passengers. Meanwhile freight trains derail regularly with some disastrous results.

He's very good at keeping his presence tamped down on the internet here's an old article but there are more.

https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1987-12-29-fi-31916-story.html

Excerpt from the article above.

My parents put me and my younger brother aboard a train to Houston in 1963 by ourselves. We were lucky there was another sister/brother group traveling alone, too. The conductor kept close watch on us the whole way. Upon arrival in Houston, we could see our grandparents waiting on the platform. The conductor asked us “who is that?” - “Grandmother and Grandaddy” was the excited response!

I was hooked from that moment on.

My husband and I love to watch YouTube videos about train travel all over the world. We agreed we would love to do this but…Amtrak accommodations, meals, poor on time arrival and departure times make us wary.

I have never understood why the US lags so far behind, Europe, Asia and elsewhere in train accommodations - now I know.

How sad. Thanks!

I suspect that there are two other reasons for his thinking: his background and Republican/Conservative dogma.

The first and most probable reason is that it has been dogma for decades in right-wing circles that public transit, and intercity transit in particular, is supposed to be inefficient and a waste of taxpayer money. Occasionally some clueless (Or, more likely, utterly dishonest) right-wing politico or pundit will pop up and make bogus claims that Amtrak and other public transportation agencies could be sold off to the private sector and be run for profit. That successful examples of such sell-offs still offering rail service at a profit for lenders and investors are very few and far between doesn't cloud the thoughts of such pundits or politicos or the rubes that believe them. And to date, neither the Easter Bunny nor the Tooth Fairy has stepped forward with capital or a business plan to assume their operation

The second reason, I believe, is Senator Moreno's background. Senator Moreno is Colombian-born. I find it plausible that he knows at least a little about Colombia's railway history and is aware that Colombia's government-owned railway network has collapsed. Therefore, being Colombian-born, he extrapolates that if government-subsidized rail service in Colombia collapsed, that must be true of government-subsidized rail service here in the United States. I find it plausible that Senator Moreno believes that rail service, or at least passenger rail service here in the US must also inefficient and funding for it must be cut off. After all, if it didn't work in Colombia, it probably won't work in the USA either.

I don't agree with such premises. But then again, I've learned that arguments based on false premises are false, regardless of one's political stripe or national origin.