A group of four Republican senators on May 27 unveiled a $928 billion infrastructure spending plan.
It was in response to U.S. President Joe Biden administration’s cutting about $74 billion from its proposed $2.3 trillion infrastructure proposal which, according to The Epoch Times’ analysis, was only intended to spend 21 percent on traditional infrastructure.
The administration now proposes $39 billion less for roads and bridges and $35 billion less for broadband.
The Biden administration has also moved some $480 billion of its proposed “infrastructure” spending into bills focused on research and development spending, or industrial policy. Therefore, it claims its “infrastructure” proposal is now only $1.7 trillion.
After adding back that $480 billion and making the adjustments for the actual text of the White House briefing document, The Epoch Times’ analysis shows that the administration is still proposing spending $2.3 trillion of the original $2.374 trillion proposed.
For their part, much of what the Republicans proposed May 27 would likely have been spent anyway.
Their own “Republican Roadmap” document, the four senators admitted, “includes [a] $91 billion increase over baseline spending for roads and bridges and a $48 billion increase over baseline spending for water infrastructure …. It also includes a one-time increase of $25 billion for airports and $65 billion for broadband… a $22 billion increase over baseline spending for passenger and freight rail and an additional $6 billion for water storage in the West.”
In other words, the Republicans’ so-called $928 billion proposal is actually offering only about $257 billion additional infrastructure funding, versus what was likely to be spent anyway.
Maybe as at least one glimmer of sunshine through these murky public negotiations: both sides now agree that $65 billion should be spent on increasing access to broadband.
