Quid pro quo: One reason Sean Duffy's filmed vacation was a really bad idea [View all]

We've been discussing a "reality TV show" called the Great American Road Trip, in which Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, his wife Fox and Friends personality Rachel Campos-Duffy, and their children (there are nine of them) take a road trip across America, apparently in a used Greyhound Bus because no other vehicle is big enough.

Let's discuss who's funding this mess.

The clearinghouse is an LLC called The Great American Road Trip. These are its sponsors:

Boeing
Toyota
Shell Oil Company
Electronic Payments Coalition
Cement Roadstone Holdings (CRH), the top asphalt producer and paving company in North America.
Google
Royal Caribbean Group
Citi Travel
American Bus Association
Comcast NBC Universal
Enterprise Rent-a-Car
United Airlines
US Travel Association
Philadelphia Convention and Visitors Bureau
Yellowstone Vacations
Visit Grand Canyon
Brand USA

I count seven entities - Boeing, Toyota, CRH, Royal Caribbean, Enterprise Rent-a-Car, Google and United Airlines - that are either regulated by or stand to make a killing from the Department of Transportation. (His vacation videos will be posted on YouTube, which is a Google property, and they'll produce lots of ad revenue for that entity. They are probably also looking for DOT contracts for Google Cloud Platform and Google Workspace.)

Folks, if a Cabinet official in a Democratic administration just accepted a free vacation - okay, seven of them - from companies his or her department regulates, the Republicans would currently be looking for a fabrication shop who could build them a guillotine. But when a Republican Cabinet official does that very thing? "The Democrats don't like it because it's too wholesome."

Besides...isn't promoting the splendor of America the Department of the Interior's job?