On the recordApril 21, 2021
Infrastructure is a bipartisan issue. We all agree that one of the primary functions of government is to provide for the people collectively what they are unable to individually provide for themselves. I am talking about things like highways and roads and dams and harbors and airports. Things that represent long-term investments in the future of our country. Unfortunately, the infrastructure package we are currently considering only devotes 12 percent of the over $2 trillion of spending to infrastructure projects like those. To give you some egregious examples, the proposed infrastructure package devotes substantially more money to subsidizing the purchase of electric vehicles than it does to building the roads and the highways that those vehicles would drive on. The proposed infrastructure package devotes over ten times as much money to expansion of Medicaid than it does to the construction of water infrastructure, of dams and of airports put together. It is not to say that these other projects are without merit, but the problem is that almost every dollar of this spending contributes to our national debt. That means that we need to consider only the projects that represent a true, long-term investment in our country. Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to pare this package down to the projects that accomplish exactly that.
