Why Norfolk Southern Is Championing Electronic Controlled Pneumatic Breaks

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The current technology that the overwhelming majority of freight train use is comes from 1868 and it's basically like a ricochet effect for a breaking. So if you have uneven loads across the cars, you really want them in order. And so the rail unions have championed these new breaks. The industry and congressional Republicans fought this very modest rule to the nail. Millions of dollars flowed into Republican campaign coppers from the railroad industry.

In this News Brief, we discuss the initial lack of coverage of the devastating February 3rd train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio; the coverage of the lack of coverage; the GOP's "white genocide" exploitation; Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg's defensiveness; and the real human stakes of decades of bipartisan deregulation and union-busting.

Our guest is journalist Matthew Cunningham-Cook (@matthewccook5), a writer and researcher covering health care, retirement policy and capital markets. He is currently a reporter at The Lever.