This week the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee favorably recommended three federal agency leadership nominees for confirmation consideration – including Sean McMaster (above) as administrator of the Federal Highway Administration.
[Above photo via the EPW committee]
The other two nominees are John Busterud to be assistant administrator for the Office of Solid Waste of the Environmental Protection Agency and Adam Telle to be assistant secretary of the U.S. Army for Civil Works.
“Sean McMaster has more than 10 years of government service, working in the U.S. House of Representatives and at federal agencies, including the U.S. Department of Transportation,” noted Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV), EPW committee chair, in a statement.
“For the last five years, McMaster has worked in two private sector transportation companies,” she added. “[His] relevant professional background, both in the public and private sectors, makes him, I believe, especially well-suited to be administrator of the FHWA.”
McMaster – recently an executive with the Boeing aerospace company and a former vice president with infrastructure consulting firm HNTB – stressed that safety would be his top priority at FHWA as he seeks to guide the agency in its mission to build and restore roads, bridges, and tunnels across the nation.
“As the transportation industry is painfully aware, delays in project delivery can delay safety enhancements and drive up project costs,” he said during a May 14 hearing before the Senate EPW committee. “Data from FHWA’s National Highway Construction Cost Index shows that transportation construction costs have increased from 1.91 in March 2021 to 3.19 in March 2024; a 67 percent increase.”
McMaster – who also previously served as deputy chief of staff at the U.S. Department of Transportation as well as the agency’s deputy assistant secretary for Congressional affairs from 2017 to 2019 – noted that he witnessed “first-hand the impacts to cost, schedule, and delivery of essential infrastructure projects during my time at HNTB working directly with state and local leaders as they were challenged to identify and attain federal funding in time to support their critical transportation infrastructure needs.”
That is why he believes “it is essential that we build projects more quickly and efficiently.”
McMaster and the other federal leadership nominees now await a vote by the full Senate to confirm their appointments.
