In less than three years, Los Angeles will host the world for the 2028 Summer Olympics, and the city's public transit system is expected to carry the load. LA Metro's plan calls for 1,700 additional buses and new high-speed lanes designed to shuttle athletes, officials, and spectators around the city during the Games — but none of it can happen without the $2 billion in promised federal transportation funding.

That money still hasn't arrived. Los Angeles-area members of Congress, led by Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove, wrote to Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy on Aug. 26 warning that the funds need to land by Sept. 1 to do any good. So far, neither Washington nor Sacramento has delivered: California's 2026-27 budget left out the $379 million Metro asked for in infrastructure upgrades, and Congress has yet to approve the roughly $875 million installment Olympic planners were counting on.

The people who'll feel the gap first aren't Olympic officials — they're the bus operators being asked to run a system that isn't fully funded, and the everyday Angelenos whose daily commutes will get squeezed by Olympic traffic on top of an already-strained transit network. Transit workers and riders deserve certainty, not a funding standoff that drags past the one deadline that actually matters.

Secretary Duffy and the Trump administration can release this funding before Sept. 1. Sign the petition to demand they act now — before the delay makes the promised buses and transit lanes useless for the Games they were meant to serve.