In December of 2019, Peter A. DeFazio was re-elected by his colleagues to be Chair of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure for the 117th Congress. The Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, the largest Committee in Congress by membership, has broad jurisdiction over the U.S. Department of Transportation (including our nation's highways, public transit, railroads, airports, pipelines, and seaports), the U.S. Coast Guard, Amtrak, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the General Services Administration, the Army Corps of Engineers, the Economic Development Administration, and other agencies.
Chair DeFazio, who represents Oregon’s 4th Congressional District, has been an active member of the Committee since he was first elected in 1986. During his time on the Committee, he has served as Chair or Ranking Member of four of the six subcommittees: Aviation, Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation, Highways and Transit, and Water Resources and Environment. DeFazio has taken a lead role on several multibillion-dollar surface transportation and FAA reauthorization bills, and worked to strengthen safety standards, worker protections, and Buy America requirements. DeFazio has a well-deserved reputation as a leader on transportation issues, working to boost investment in a robust, multimodal transportation system to ensure the United States remains globally competitive. In 2020, DeFazio was successful in passing H.R. 2, the Moving Forward Act, in the House. This ambitious 5-year, $1.5 trillion bill invests in highways, rail, transit, airports, ports and harbors, wastewater and drinking water infrastructure, brownfields, broadband, and much more.
In 2020, Chair DeFazio also led the successful passage of three major pieces of bipartisan legislation that were signed into law: the Water Resources Development Act of 2020; the Elijah E. Cummings Coast Guard Authorization Act of 2020; and the Aircraft Certification, Safety, and Accountability Act, which reforms and strengthens the FAA’s aircraft certification process in the wake of two deadly Boeing 737 MAX crashes and reflects the findings from the Committee’s 18-month investigation into the design, development and certification of the MAX.