Thanks to Ohio and Wisconsin, which both just elected Republican governors who vowed to kill federally funded high-speed rail, Washington State will get an additional $161 million to fund rail here, WSDOT secretary Paula Hammond announced today. The money was slated to pay for rail connecting cities in those two states; now it will help fund rail in the corridor connecting Portland, Seattle, and Vancouver, B.C.

"It would appear that some of my colleagues around the country don't want to take fast trains," Gregoire said at during the announcement of the winning bidder for the deep-bore tunnel this afternoon. "We do."

The money brings Washington State's total federal funding for passenger rail to $782 million.