When my brothers and I were kids, we watched music videos for hours. After school, summer mornings, late at night — the time didn’t matter; we wanted MTV.
Over the years, we spent more time playing sports and watched less television. Meanwhile, MTV spent more time airing reality shows and played less music videos.
I tried to get into MTV’s “The Real World,” but reality TV has never been my thing. To this day, I am baffled by the people who go on them.
I think: “Who would want a camera in their face all day like that?”
Sean Duffy, that’s who.
Duffy, who is President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for Secretary of Transportation, became famous on MTV. He was a cast member on “The Real World: Boston,” “Road Rules: All Stars” and “Real World/Road Rules Challenge: Battle of the Seasons.”
Compared to President-elect Trump’s other cabinet nominees, Duffy is a breath of fresh air. He served in the U.S. House of Representatives for eight years, and he worked as a district attorney in Wisconsin before running for Congress in 2011.
But is he qualified to run a government agency with an annual budget of
$293.21 billion?
In Congress, Duffy served as chairman of the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations and on the House Committee on Financial Services.
He has little to no experience in the transportation field.
Each state has a secretary of transportation with more experience (Not to mention former state secretaries of transportation who could be nominated).
With so many leaders out there who are experts in the field and know how to do the job, why choose Duffy, who now has to learn the field and how to do the job?
Until he was nominated, Duffy worked as co-host of “The Bottom Line” on Fox Business. Did Trump select Duffy because he saw him on TV? It’s possible.
This is a crucial time for the Transportation Department. The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) just celebrated its third anniversary, and that influx of money — the $1.2 trillion infrastructure package will deliver $550 billion in federal investments over five years— needs an experienced leader who understands the transportation field as the country approaches the law’s finish line.
I hope Duffy is ready. I hope he is dedicated to revising and extending the IIJA. I hope he is focused on rehabilitating and revolutionizing America’s infrastructure.
But I am not optimistic. The Department of Transportation has suffered under a string of unqualified secretaries, while state DOTs have incredible leaders who are ready for prime time, if you will.
I hope Duffy makes me a fool for doubting him. Anyone who works as a district attorney and congressman probably shouldn’t be doubted.
But I was wired to doubt our leaders and institutions. Blame it on the hours I spent watching MTV as a kid. RB
About the Author
Gavin Jenkins, Senior Managing Editor
Senior Managing Editor
Gavin Jenkins is an award-winning journalist based in Pittsburgh. His work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, VICE, Narrative.ly, Prevention, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review and Beijing Review.
In 2020, two stories he wrote for Pitt Med Magazine earned three Golden Quill Awards from the Press Club of Western Pennsylvania. “Surviving Survival” won Excellence in Corporate, Marketing and Promotional Communications – Written, Medical/Health, while “Oct. 27, 2018: Pittsburgh’s Darkest Day, and the Mass Casualty Response” won Excellence in Written Journalism, Magazines – Medical/Health, as well as the Ray Sprigle Memorial Award: Magazines, a Best in Show award.
After graduating from the University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown in 2003, he covered sports for the Bedford Gazette, in Bedford, Pa., and the Martinsville Bulletin, in Martinsville, Va. In 2006, he returned to Pittsburgh to write for Trib Total Media. Based out of the Kittanning Leader Times, he worked for the Trib for two years, and then he moved to Shenzhen, China, to teach English and freelance. After two years in China, he earned an MFA in nonfiction from the University of Pittsburgh.
When he's not at work, he's usually playing with his border-collie mix, Bob.