Elaine Chao appears before the Senate. Photo: Agence France-Presse/Getty Images .

March 5, 2017 6:17 p.m. ET 70 COMMENTS

The Obama Administration may have left town, but its legacy lives on across the country in Sacramento. So congratulations to Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao for putting a stop to some dubious grant-making for San Francisco Democrats by a former Obama official in another imbroglio for California’s bullet train.

Last month Ms. Chao said she is delaying indefinitely a $647 million federal grant for the Caltrain commuter service that former Federal Transit Administration chief Carolyn Flowers approved two days before President Obama left office. Ms. Flowers now works at an engineering company that is a contractor for the Caltrain project. Last week Governor Jerry Brown sent a letter to Ms. Chao begging her to release the funds pronto. “Can we discuss this on the phone?” he asked in a handwritten note.

California’s 14 House Republicans have asked Ms. Chao to withhold the federal cash until an audit is completed on California’s misbegotten bullet train. An internal Federal Railroad Administration analysis in December found that the train’s first segment in the sparsely populated Central Valley is running 50% over budget.

How does the electrification of Caltrain connect to high-speed rail? Good question. The bullet train will supposedly link to Caltrain, though that may not be for several decades, if ever, at the current rate of construction. Since the choo choo may never reach the Bay Area due to litigation and funding shortfalls, Bay Area Democrats late last year wrote legislation that would make $600 million of the $10 billion in high-speed rail bonds that voters approved in 2008 available for electrifying Caltrain. This may be unconstitutional as legislators aren’t allowed to amend measures passed by voters, and some taxpayers have sued.

Ms. Flowers decided to help her progressive friends in San Francisco on her way out the door by fast-tracking the federal grant for Caltrain. Now she’s returned through the other door to collect a piece of the cash. Sacramento is America’s western swamp.