Biden Sends in Cabinet Members to Sell Infrastructure Plan

Members of President Joe Biden's cabinet went to Capitol Hill Tuesday to sell Biden's $2.3 trillion infrastructure plan in a hearing before the Senate Appropriations Committee.

"We draw inspiration from the New Deal's infrastructure projects and President Eisenhower's Interstate Highway System, but we cannot afford to rely on the original version of the roads, bridges, and airports they built all those years ago," Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said, according to The Hill.

Under Biden's plan, significant improvements would be made to roads and bridges. Money would also be used for enacting climate change policies, retrofitting old buildings, expanding broadband, increasing public housing lots, and modernizing the electric grid.

"During the pandemic we have seen that high-speed broadband service is not a luxury, but a necessity for jobs, education and healthcare," Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said.

Republicans, however, considered the administration's definition of infrastructure too broad. Alabama Republican Sen. Richard Shelby, vice chairman of the committee, said, "The administration's proposal, on the other hand, is so broad and ambiguous that it seems there is little, if anything, they do not consider infrastructure."

Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, said, "It's certainly appropriate to look ahead and to accommodate future and cleaner modes of transportation, but what the administration is doing is spending billions more on subsidies related to electric vehicles than on the roads and bridges on which they will travel."

Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan and Sen. John Neely Kennedy, R-La., engaged in the following exchange about climate change:

"I don't have a figure in front of me that specifies how much, in isolation, this bill lowers world temperature based on just U.S. participation," Regan said.

"So we're just going to spend $2.3 trillion and find out, on a wing and a prayer?" Kennedy replied.

Both sides agreed; however, not enough money is being spent on infrastructure. When comparing spending of gross domestic product on infrastructure, the United States spends around 2.3 percent of its GDP while China spends about double that at 5.6 percent.

Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., asked each of Biden's four cabinet members which solution would reach a bipartisan agreement.

Regan pointed to water infrastructure, Buttigieg to surface transportation, Raimondo to the CHIPS for America Act, which would increase domestic semiconductor manufacturing, and Housing and Urban Development Secretary Marcia Fudge pointed to upgrading existing public housing.