On December 8th, Amtrak released a statement declaring that the U.S. Department of Transportation's Federal Railroad Administration has awarded Amtrak and its partners more than $2.1 billion in federal grants to improve existing routes and advance plans to expand Amtrak across the United States. Among the Amtrak projects, in partnership with Texas Central Railway, is a $500,000 study grant for the proposed Texas High-Speed Rail Corridor. The proposed project, backed by a Japanese-funded company, is to try to build a route between Dallas and Houston by cutting through farmland and homes across Texas.

"I will never support private companies abusing eminent domain powers for land grab projects like this, especially in the 6th district of Texas," said Ellzey. "I will continue to pursue the many unanswered questions about the foreign funding and unrealistic ridership projections of this project from Amtrak, the Federal Railroad Administration, and Texas Central."

Ellzey continued, "This project does not only impact rural Texas but all of the United States. In a time of a global food shortage, we cannot allow our farmland to be destroyed, and taxpayer dollars squandered for an unsustainable and unnecessary project like this."

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