Republicans Prepare Counteroffer to Biden’s Infrastructure Plan

Wednesday, April 14, 2021

Republicans Prepare a Counteroffer to Biden’s Infrastructure Plan

Republican lawmakers are preparing their own infrastructure proposal as a counteroffer to President Joe Biden’s $2.3 trillion American Jobs Plan.

The still-developing proposal is expected to be considerably smaller and more narrowly focused than Biden’s, in the range of $600 billion to $800 billion, and be funded by "unspecified user fees" that target those who benefit from whatever construction or repair is included in the plan, Politico’s Sam Mintz reported Wednesday.

"The pay-for ought to come from the people who are using it," Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT) told reporters Wednesday. "If it’s an airport, the people who are flying. If it’s a port, the people who are shipping into the port. If it’s highways, it ought to be gas if it’s a gasoline-powered vehicle. If it’s an electric vehicle some kind of mileage associated with that electric vehicle that would be similar to a gas tax."

The meaning of "infrastructure:" Romney’s comments highlight two of the key criticisms of Biden’s plan made by Republicans. First, they don’t want to roll back the 2017 Trump tax cuts or impose new taxes to fund infrastructure spending. Second, they object to the way Biden’s plan covers a wide range of issues, ranging from bridges and highways to housing and elder care, under the rubric of infrastructure.

"What I'd like to do is get back to what I consider the regular definition of infrastructure in terms of job creation," Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV), the ranking member on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, told CNBC Wednesday. "So that's roads, bridges, ports, airports, including broadband into that, water infrastructure."

Capito also said that removing what Republicans see as extraneous items from the infrastructure plan would be necessary to win bipartisan support. "If we’re going to do this together — which we want to do and is our desire — we’ve got to find those areas and take away the extra infrastructure areas that the president put into his bill like home-health aids and school building and all of these kinds of things," Capito said.

White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain met with the bipartisan Problem Solvers group of lawmakers Wednesday afternoon to continue to explore the possibility of bipartisan cooperation on the package.

Multiple smaller bills? One Republican lawmaker said they might break the proposal into separate bills, each focused on a specific area, so to avoid the inclusion of anything unrelated to that issue.

"A general principle for me is that we shouldn't have a huge bill with a bunch of stuff thrown" in, Sen. Deb Fischer (R-NE), ranking member of the Senate Commerce Transportation subcommittee, told Politico. "If you want road users to pay for it, have a bill that only deals with roads. If you want waterways to be part of the bill, then you have a bill that only deals with that so you can find appropriate pay-fors if you want a user fee," Fischer said. "I've always been a strong proponent of going segment by segment."

Americans express support for Biden’s plan: A new Morning Consult/Politico poll shows that a majority of American voters support Biden’s plan to spend heavily on a wide variety of infrastructure issues while raising taxes on corporations to pay for it.

"Biden’s slate of economic policies, especially his stimulus package, have enjoyed consistently broad support from both Republican and Democratic voters," Morning Consult said. In the last week, however, Republican support has slipped, likely driven by increasingly vocal opposition to Biden’s plan by GOP lawmakers. Republican voters seem particularly opposed to Biden’s expansive definition of infrastructure, and to his plan to raise corporate taxes to cover costs.

Still, the poll shows solid support for Biden’s big plans, and most voters don’t seem too worried about labeling issues such as child care and internet access as infrastructure. "As long as it’s something they like, the Biden administration can call it whatever they want," Politico Playbook said.

The chart below shows the levels of support for various categories of spending included in Biden’s proposal. A majority of respondents, including both Democrats and Republicans, say that roads, transportation, housing and internet are infrastructure issues. A majority of respondents, but not a majority of Republicans, also support the inclusion of caregiving and child care, with support dropping to 43% and 40% among GOP voters on those issues. Of the seven categories included in the poll, only one — paid leave — failed to win support from a majority of respondents.

Democrats Propose Sweeping Reform of Unemployment System

Two Senate Democrats on Wednesday introduced legislation to overhaul the nation’s unemployment insurance system after the coronavirus exposed flaws in the existing structure.

The sweeping proposal sponsored by Sens. Ron Wyden of Oregon and Michael Bennet of Colorado aims to raise base benefits, create a permanent benefit for self-employed and gig workers, minimize differences between state programs and tie extended benefits to the unemployment rate.

The draft bill, titled the Unemployment Insurance Modernization Act, would require all states to offer at least 26 weeks of benefits and replace 75% of a worker’s typical wages up to a set maximum.

"The COVID-19 pandemic has made it overwhelmingly clear that our nation’s unemployment insurance system is inadequate and unreliable for workers when they lose a job," said Bennet. "Unemployment programs are critical to helping workers stay afloat during difficult times — but too many workers still struggle to access their benefits in our patchwork of outdated state systems. And too many receive no protection at all when they lose a job — including many low-wage workers, workers of color, returning caregivers, and self-employed workers. This proposal will protect workers by strengthening and expanding benefits, modernize UI infrastructure with needed technology investments, and prepare us for the future by tying benefits to economic conditions."

Why it matters: "Wyden and Bennet maintain they have an opportunity to advance their reforms as part of Democrats’ broader rethinking of the country’s safety net programs," writes The Washington Post’s Tony Romm. "President Biden is set to unveil a multi-trillion-dollar proposal in the coming weeks that aims to provide new aid to workers, parents and children facing financial hardship. Wyden and Bennet said they have already encouraged Biden to overhaul unemployment insurance as part of that package, which has been dubbed the American Families Plan."

More than 18 million people collected unemployment benefits in the week ending March 20, according to the Labor Department.

Read more at The Washington Post or CNBC.

New Batch of Stimulus Payments Brings Total Sent to More Than $376 Billion

The U.S. government said Wednesday that it had sent out another round of $1,400 Economic Impact Payments, more commonly called stimulus checks. This batch, the fifth under the American Rescue Plan Act enacted last month, included about 2 million payments for a total of more than $3.4 billion. More than 320,000 payments, with a total value of $450 million, went to Veterans Affairs beneficiaries who receive Compensation and Pension benefits but who don’t normally file a tax return and didn’t use the IRS’s non-filers tool last year, the Treasury Department said.

The latest round of payments lifts the total number made to about 159 million and the total amount disbursed to more than $376 billion.

Rep. Kevin Brady Announces He Will Retire at End of His Term

Rep. Kevin Brady (R-TX), the ranking Republican on the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, announced Wednesday that he will retire from Congress at the end of his term.
"This term, my 13th, will be the last," he said at an appearance before the Woodlands Area Chamber of Commerce in his district north of Houston.

Brady, 66, has represented Texas’s 8th district in Congress since 1997 and has been the top Republican on the powerful Ways and Means Committee since November 2015, when the previous chair, Paul Ryan, became House speaker. As head of the committee, Brady was a key architect of the 2017 Republican tax cuts.

Brady said that he is retiring in part because Republican term limit rules will force him to step down from his committee post.

"As you may not know, because Republicans limit committee leadership to six years, I won’t be able to chair the Ways and Means committee in the next session when Republicans win back the House majority. Did that factor in? Honestly, some," he said.

In a statement, House Ways and Means Chair Richard Neal (D-MA) called Brady’s decision to retire "a loss for both the Ways and Means Committee and Congress," adding that he and Brady "have been able to overcome ideological differences time and time again to partner on behalf of the American people."

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Republicans Prepare Counteroffer to Biden’s Infrastructure Plan