As Senate Republicans are wary of massive spending bills increasing inflation, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said Tuesday his caucus has a plan that will fully fund up to $6 trillion in infrastructure.
Democrats on the Senate Budget Committee, which is chaired by self-proclaimed democratic socialist Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., are mulling a massive spending number between $3.5 trillion and $6 trillion on both traditional infrastructure — roads, bridges and broadband — and human infrastructure like President Joe Biden's American Families Plan.
Paying for all of that infrastructure "is doable" through tax increases, other revenue-raisers and spending reform, Schumer told reporters after the Democrats' caucus lunch, The Hill reported.
"One of the things that was presented in our caucus is that we could fully pay for the bill," Schumer said. "That's one of the options on the table. That is doable, absolutely."
Moderate Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., stressed that he wanted the entire cost of a $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure package and Democrats' larger budget reconciliation bill of at least $3.5 trillion to include pay-fors.
"I think everything should be paid for," Manchin told reporters before the lunch, The Hill reported. "We've put enough free money out."
The $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill, which Biden had warned would have to be sent to his desk in order to sign the $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure deal, is a total Democrats say they are "trending" toward in a compromise, according to the report.
Biden has planned pay-fors of up to $2.4 trillion through spending reforms and tax increases, including raising the corporate tax rate from 21% to 28%. Former President Donald Trump had dropped the corporate tax rate to the former as part of his administration's tax reform package.
Democrats are not unilaterally on board for fully funding the spending bills, though, preferring to borrow against the national debt like a mortgage.
"I think it's nuts to not amortize payments for infrastructure," said Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., The Hill reported. "Hard infrastructure is the kind of thing you should be paying for over the course of 30, 40, 50 years.
"I didn't pay for my house in cash."
Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., a member of the Budget Committee, agreed, saying "I think that's a really legitimate point," according to The Hill.
Late last week, Trump implored those he called "RINO Republicans" to stop giving into Democrats' massive spending agenda, because they are "just being played by the Radical Left Democrats" who "will give you nothing."
"Very important that Senate Republicans not allow our hard-earned tax reductions to be terminated or amended in an upward trajectory in any way, shape, or form," Trump wrote in a statement from his Save America PAC on Friday. "They should not be making deals on increasing taxes for the fake infrastructure proposals being put forward by Democrats, almost all of which goes to the ridiculous Green New Deal Marxist agenda.
"Keep the Trump administration tax cuts just where they are," he continued. "Do not allow tax increases. Thinking about it, I have never seen anything so easy to win politically."
Eric Mack ✉
Eric Mack has been a writer and editor at Newsmax since 2016. He is a 1998 Syracuse University journalism graduate and a New York Press Association award-winning writer.
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.