Amtrak is government subsidized, I’m sure they’re saddled with debt and inflexible Union contracts. Government owned companies become safe-havens for low to mid level political functionaries that served their political parties interests but couldn’t break out into the big time themselves.
These people generally have impressive looking, yet functionally worthless CV’s and end up in positions where they can unintentional inflict the worst damage possible to an organization that should be a market driven free enterprise.
"The Peter Principle" lives.