White House: Trump committed to $1T infrastructure plan
White House: Trump committed to $1T infrastructure plan
By Melanie Zanona - 05/01/17 04:29 PM EDT
The Trump administration said Monday that the president remains committed to upgrading U.S. roads, bridges and airports, even though a rebuilding proposal was not released within his first 100 days in office.
White House press secretary Sean Spicer said during his daily briefing that Trump “absolutely” intends to unveil a $1 trillion infrastructure package sometime this year.
“He’s been working on that with both his economic and policy team, but this week we’re a little busy with the [spending bill] and healthcare,” Spicer said.
“It’s clearly still up there on the priority list. Lets get through this week and then hopefully have some additional details moving forward.”
Trump promised on the campaign trail to submit an infrastructure proposal to Congress within his first 100 days as president, but the timeline was pushed back as GOP leadership and the White House vowed to first tackle healthcare and tax reform.
In recent weeks, Trump had floated the idea of linking his rebuilding plan with other legislative priorities to attract more support for his tax overhaul or healthcare proposal, because he said infrastructure is “so popular” among Democrats.
But the administration introduced a tax plan last week that did not set aside money for infrastructure, as some had hoped, while the bill to repeal and replace ObamaCare has not been linked to the issue either.
Congressional leaders predict that an infrastructure package will be released sometime this summer.
http://thehill.com/policy/transporta...structure-plan