Calling Out In Transit: ‘Train Lovers for Harris-Walz’ Raise $12K in One Zoom Room

Nothing stops the money train.

After hundreds of thousands of Black women, Black men, white women, and white "dudes" raised millions of dollars for Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign in online telethons, transit enthusiasts gathered virtually on Thursday night to sound the whistle 12,000 times.

Transit-friendly Congress members, state legislative reps, and activists headlined the 90-minute “Train Lovers for Harris Walz” Zoom call to galvanize attention on the least weird thing around: good public transit. 

“We don’t need people making buses and bikes part of some silly cultural war,” said Beth Osborne, director of Transportation For America who was attending in her personal capacity. "We need to get out there and campaign, get out the vote, text people, knock on doors, and we need to donate to the campaign."

Harris and Walz have just begun rolling out their economic plan, less than one month after President Biden announced he would not run for re-election, but they haven’t delved into their transportation agenda yet. That didn’t stop Democratic lawmakers on the telethon call from extrapolating what the Harris administration may do – or at least should do — starting on Jan. 20, 2025.

California Democratic Rep. Robert Garcia told the roughly 400 people on the call that Vice President Harris and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz understand the significance of weaning the country off fossil fuels and expanding public transit. He also touted his own record, as mayor of Long Beach, of adding dedicated bike lanes and converting its gas-powered bus fleet to electric vehicles. 

“We’ve had a progressive model in Long Beach for a long time and a lot of us have been through these big fights, but we’re at a different place today,” he said. “More people understand how to build bike lanes, fight NIMBYs, that everyone has to drive, and that we only have a car future and that’s not the case.”

Elected officials from Harris’s and Walz’s hometowns also expressed confidence that the pair would continue funding infrastructure projects that promoted multi-modal transit while reducing America’s dependence on monitor vehicles.

Minnesota State Rep. Larry Kraft, who represents St. Louis Park, mentioned the state’s groundbreaking law that directed the state's Department of Transportation to consider the effect that new roadway projects will have on greenhouse gas emissions and vehicle miles traveled — and, more important, abandon them if they were harmful.

We know which governor signed that bill.

"The new policy is a critical cog in Gov. Tim Walz’s plan to cut greenhouse gas emissions to net zero by 2050," the Star-Tribune reported.

John Bauters, the former mayor of Emeryville, Calif. and a livable streets legend, noted that Alameda County, where Harris launched her career, has one of the highest number of pedestrian fatalities in the Bay Area, but a federal grant helped him make 28 road crossings near schools and hospitals safer. 

And California State Sen. Scott Wiener, who represents San Francisco and is also huge on Train Twitter, has worked to ensure the Bay Area’s transit systems remain solvent after the pandemic. He hopes to stabilize BART and MUNI by 2026 and is working toward a ballot measure to fund transit in the region.

“I’ve known Harris for 22 years. I know she’s supportive of public transportation,” he said. “The U.S. spends so much less of our GDP on rail than other countries. I want high speed rail in California but I want it all over the country in addition to great bus service. We know how to do it and with this administration we can make real progress in this direction.”

It wasn’t the only online event for Harris held that night. Thousands of people attended a “Jewish Women for Kamala” Zoom that featured Barbra Streisand. Housing advocates are also planning to lead a “YIMBYs for Harris” livestream call on Aug. 28.

Wiener, who also attended the YIMBY call, was encouraged that Harris promised to work with the real estate industry to build three million new homes and remove barriers to development at the state and local levels on the campaign trail.  

“It used to be pretty lonely to be a YIMBY elected official. That era is over,” he tweeted on Friday.