Chris Van Hollen: “I support the nomination of Elaine Chao to be Secretary of Transportation. Ms. Chao has proven a capable manager. She…”

“I support the nomination of Elaine Chao to be Secretary of Transportation. Ms. Chao has proven a capable manager. She has served in several administrations, including as Secretary of Labor and Deputy Secretary of Transportation. Her experience will serve the Transportation Department and the Cabinet well. At the Department of Transportation, Ms. Chao will be responsible for implementing one of President Trump's most ambitious agenda items--a massive investment in infrastructure. During the campaign, Mr. Trump proposed to invest $1 trillion to rebuild infrastructure over the next decade. And on November 9, 2016, President-Elect Trump said, ``We are going to fix our inner cities and rebuild our highways, bridges, tunnels, airports, schools, hospitals. We're going to rebuild our infrastructure, which will become, by the way, second to none. And we will put millions of our people to work as we rebuild it.'' While we have received few details on the plan, I hope that Ms. Chao will work closely with Congress to identify needs within our States and invest broadly in roads, bridges, airports, rail, and transit. While I believe that public-private partnerships can be one avenue to drive transportation projects, we cannot rely on them to be the backbone of a transportation plan, as many communities would struggle to assemble the financing necessary to make such projects viable. Our Nation's public infrastructure has historically been a bipartisan priority.…”