Ray LaHood: Obama's Transportation Secretary

Ray LaHood: Obama's Transportation Secretary

The Chicago Tribune, along with other news organizations, reports:

Peoria Republican congressman Ray LaHood has been asked to be Transportation Secretary for the Obama Administration, a Republican source said today.

A spokesman for the Obama transition team declined to comment and LaHood's office did not immediately return phone calls.

But associates of LaHood previously had been told that he was a "front-runner" for the post and that he was was "interested."

Progress Illinois gives a good rundown of LaHood's record:

The moderate Republican has broken with his party over Amtrak funding, voting yes last summer to expand passenger rail service. In 2005, he told the Peoria Journal-Star that "we've got a good Amtrak system in Illinois and I don't think we want to destroy it by talking about privatization." In 2006, he received a 66 percent rating from the American Road and Transportation Builders Association, a major transportation construction lobby. He also voted in favor of the Saving Energy Through Public Transportation Act of 2008, a bill to promote increased public transportation use that garnered string bi-partisan support. Other than that, we know very little.

Ray LaHood's website is here. You can read more about LaHood on Wikipedia. Project Vote Smart has more on the future Transportation Secretary's record. The Washington Post has Ray LaHood's full voting history.

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