This just in, from Union Pacific: “CEO Jim Vena was honored to meet [POTUS 47] in the Oval Office, a special place for America with a longstanding history. They discussed how creating an American [sic*] transcontinental railroad is a win for U.S. competition, consumers, and the unionized workers whose jobs will be protected when the merger is approved, allowing railroads to grow and take more trucks off taxpayer funded highways. They also addressed the safety and security of all Americans, and that we regularly collaborate with communities to keep our employees and customers’ cargo safe.”
Note UP’s statement says “when,” not “if,” the merger is approved.
Vena’s hat-in-hand pilgrimage to POTUS 47, where he no doubt spent the first 10 minutes fawning over and congratulating the President—as is expected of even world leaders darkening this President’s White House doorstep—is no surprise. Vena has put UP shareholders on the hook for a $2.5 billion breakup fee should the merger with NS be disallowed by regulators. Vena’s career and reputation are on the line. Ukraine’s Volodymir Zelenskyy learned at great pain current White House protocols.
That said, the STB is an independent (of the Executive Branch) regulatory agency, but pardon impartial observers for their skepticism, especially following POTUS 47’s firing of STB Democratic member Robert E. Primus, whose past votes suggested he would be a “no” vote on UP+NS.
Add to this the Republican-controlled Senate’s scuttling Sept. 11 of that chamber’s precedents by lowering the 60-vote threshold for approving Presidential nominees to just a simple majority. The result effectively blocks in-the-minority Democrats from effectively challenging or delaying White House nominees. While the rules change was not directed at STB nominees to fill vacancies, surely UP’s lobbyists reported this as a means, through the White House, of packing the STB with POTUS 47 partisans. And there you have purpose in the Vena trek to Washington.
Now, should UP and NS file a formal merger application by Oct. 29, as expected, STB members voting on the merger carry an unprecedented burden to provide detailed, fully understandable-to-the-public reasoning as to their votes. There must not be the slightest suggestion a vote was politically motivated. Their careers and reputations equally are on the line. To quote comic David Letterman, “I wouldn’t wish this on a monkey on a rock.”
From what we know of the two sitting Republican members—and we think we know them well—is that they would be livid, and justifiably so, at any suggestion a fix could be in. Vena has dumped them in a most undeserved briar patch.
*Should be “U.S. transcontinental railroad.”
