Since 1975, the Canadian National Railway (CN) and the Canadian Pacific Kansas City (CPKC) Southern Railway have reported 3,488 deaths and 107,254 serious injuries or hazardous incidents at their bases of operation.

Despite these alarming statistics, railroad company executives, management, and directors may have circumvented accountability because public police forces surrendered their jurisdiction to the very companies that could be at fault.

Unlike public police forces whose funding, public complaints management, oversight, and employment arrangements are accountable to public authorities, railway companies operating in the U.S. consolidate these functions under their own private corporate control, even when the companies’ interests and potential legal liability are in question. The ultimate authority over CN and CPKC’s U.S. railroad police, which includes employment and disciplinary matters, is vested in their corporate chief legal officers who are based in Canada — a foreign country.

Particularly concerning is the toxic and explosive nature of rail cargo, including hazardous substances and rail security-sensitive materials such as military grade weapons, both of which can be embargoed onto private corporate property by railway companies.

A legal challenge recently filed by Canadian attorney Tavengwa Runyowa addresses the constitutionality of private railway police. Runyowa explains, “When U.S. police powers operate under a command structure controlled by private interests in another country, and by individuals whose security clearances in the U.S. are unverified by the American public, this creates risks to America’s national security and sovereignty over criminal law, data privacy, and citizens’ civil rights.” He emphasizes, “In Canada, these companies used their ownership of police forces with federal powers to shield themselves from independent investigations and accountability for deaths, injuries, and other wrongdoing.”

For more information, refer to the Official Legal Challenge Filing and and the Independent Report on Railway Policing.

Please contact your congresspersons and demand:

1. Congressional hearings to investigate railroad policing activities and cross-border command in the U.S. and to determine the extent these activities undermine national security and sovereignty.
2. An end to corporate, private, and foreign-controlled railroad policing in the U.S.
3. U.S. intervention in the Canadian legal proceedings to protect American interests.