Roy Blunt: “this is an important issue that is being discussed on the floor. I join Senator Blumenthal certainly in my commitment to…”

“this is an important issue that is being discussed on the floor. I join Senator Blumenthal certainly in my commitment to do whatever we can to extend more choice to veterans. I believe there are less than a handful of issues in which the VA is, in all likelihood, the best provider. They should be better at post- traumatic stress than anything else. The VA should be better at IED- attack injuries. They should be better at prosthetics. There is no reason they should be the better place to have your heart valve replaced or your kidney cancer dealt with. More choice for veterans is better for veterans, and will make the VA a better provider than the VA is today. So I am certainly supportive of that discussion. Mr. President, Senator Warner and I today have filed an amendment to the transportation bill, which is the part of this debate that deals with transportation. The BRIDGE Act creates new ways to help us fund our Nation's infrastructure. Last year, Congress was finally able to come together to pass a bipartisan highway bill, the FAST Act. It took a while to get to the FAST Act. We had 37 short-term extensions of the highway bill from 2009 on, but we finally have a 5-year highway bill that provides certainty for the next 5 years. This is a chance when, at every level of government, we can now put extra tools in the toolbox, and we can involve the private sector in ways that it has not been involved as a funding partner.…”