Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy is taking a victory lap after a court dismissed California's lawsuit over $4 billion in withdrawn funding for the state's embattled high-speed rail project. Governor Gavin Newsom and California officials aren't getting their money back, and Duffy couldn't be happier about it.

Billions Saved, According to Duffy

In a post on X over the weekend, Duffy framed the court decision as protecting taxpayers from throwing good money after bad. He said the Trump administration was "protecting billions of American taxpayers' dollars from funding California's ridiculous train to nowhere."

The Department of Transportation pulled the plug on funding back in July, citing a project that's ballooned to an estimated $100 billion price tag. The ambitious rail line would connect Los Angeles with San Francisco, assuming it ever gets built.

Trump Calls It 'Severely Overpriced'

President Donald Trump has been vocal about his disdain for California's rail dreams, describing the project as "severely overpriced." Instead of funneling billions into the California project, his administration redirected over $2.4 billion toward a $5 billion initiative to improve passenger rail infrastructure across the entire country. Relations between Trump and California have been frosty since he took office earlier this year.

Meanwhile, in Autonomous Rail News

On a different rail track entirely, former SpaceX employee Matt Soule is building something that might actually work. His Los Angeles-based startup, Parallel Systems, is developing autonomous freight trains and just raised over $38 million in Series B funding. The company is currently running a pilot project in Georgia, proving that innovation in rail doesn't have to cost $100 billion.