Trump selects Fox News contributor Sean Duffy as transport secretary

Donald Trump has named Sean Duffy, a former Republican congressman from Wisconsin, Fox News contributor, and former cast member of the MTV show The Real World, to serve as the secretary of transportation.

Duffy served in Congress from 2011 until 2019. Before being elected to public office, he was district attorney for Ashland county, Wisconsin, from 2002 to 2008 and previously had a reality TV show role. Duffy was a cast member on The Real World: Boston in 1997 where he would meet his wife, Fox news contributor Rachel Campos-Duffy.

“He will prioritize Excellence, Competence, Competitiveness and Beauty when rebuilding America’s highways, tunnels, bridges and airports,” the president-elect said in a statement announcing his nomination. “He will ensure our ports and dams serve our Economy without compromising our National Security, and he will make our skies safe again by eliminating DEI for pilots and air traffic controllers.”

During his time in Congress, Duffy, 53, faced immense backlash for comments he made on CNN about the difference between white supremacist mass violence and violence carried out by the Islamic State. He also said that one of the “good things” that came from the 2015 mass shooting at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal church (AME) was that it led Nikki Haley, the then governor of South Carolina, to remove the confederate flag from the state capitol.

After the backlash, Duffy said that the massacre at Emanuel AME was horrific but the shooter was not a part of an organized terror group such as IS. He encouraged the government to continue to monitor large hate groups such as the KKK.

In a March 2017 op-ed Duffy penned for the Milaukee Journal-Sentinel after Trump’s first State of the Union, the former congressman praised Trump’s dedication to working with conglomerates such as Ford, General Motors and Walmart to combine efforts to “reinvest in America”.

Duffy, a father to nine children, resigned from Congress in 2019, citing complications during his wife’s pregnancy for the couple’s ninth child and his desire to spend more time with his family.

If confirmed, Duffy will oversee aviation, automotive, rail, transit and other transportation policies at the department with about a $110bn budget as well as significant funding remaining under the Biden administration’s 2021 $1tn infrastructure law.

Trump has vowed to reverse the Biden administration’s vehicle emissions rules. He has said he plans to begin the process of undoing the Biden administration’s stringent emissions regulations finalized earlier this year as soon as he takes office. The rules cut tailpipe emissions limits by 50% from 2026 levels by 2032 and prod automakers to build more EVs.