With help from Gavin Bade and Alex Guillén
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A WORD GAME: Biden administration officials continued to pitch the president’s $2.5 trillion infrastructure plan on the Sunday morning news shows, where they were repeatedly challenged over the plan’s broad scope. Fox News’ Chris Wallace and White House National Economic Council Director Brian Deese sparred over whether hundreds of billions of dollars for housing and elderly and disabled care — which Wallace likened to “a social program” — belonged in an infrastructure proposal. ”Well, look, I think we really need to update what we mean by infrastructure for the 21st century,” Deese said.
Likewise: Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg similarly defended the administration’s vision on ABC’s “This Week” after Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) suggested on the program (as well as on “Fox News Sunday”) that Democrats would have a better chance of winning bipartisan support if they narrowed the focus to what has been considered traditional infrastructure and away from areas like electric vehicles. And then “the other 70 or so percent of the package that doesn’t have very much to do with infrastructure, if you want to force that in a partisan way, you could still do that,” he said.
Buttigieg’s response to Blunt: Infrastructure is about more than roads and bridges, he said. He added that he would work to try to convince Blunt that “electric vehicle charging infrastructure is absolutely a core part of how Americans are going to need to get around in the future.”
Further opposition: Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) also blasted the administration’s proposed corporate tax hike to fund the plan on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “What the president proposed this week is not an infrastructure bill, it’s a huge tax increase,” he said. “How could the president expect to have bipartisanship when his proposal is a repeal of one of [Republicans’] signature issues in 2017?”
IT’S MONDAY: You’re reading Morning Transportation, your guide to what Washington’s doing on planes, trains, cars and everything that moves. MT would love to hear your tips, pitches and feedback about the next four years. Get in touch at [email protected] or @samjmintz.
“Since he went away the blues walked in and met me / If he stays away, old rocking chair will get me / All I do is pray the Lord above will let me walk in the sun once more.”
A message from SEIU:
President Biden is investing $400 billion in care workers — largely women of color & immigrants working on the frontlines of this pandemic. We have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to create millions of sustainable union care jobs of the future. It’s time for Congress to pass President Biden’s jobs plan! Learn more
THE ROAD AHEAD: When handicapping the chances that President Joe Biden’s infrastructure plan passes Congress, it’s important to make the distinction between “a bill” getting through and “this bill,” said Peter Rogoff, a former high-ranking DOT official and longtime Hill staffer who is now the CEO of Sound Transit in Seattle.
“This bill as proposed is incredibly bold, incredibly transformative,” Rogoff said Friday on a webinar put on by JTR Strategies. “I think it hits all of the right buttons on what some people think are ancillary issues to transportation, but are really quite relevant, especially as it relates to climate change, and things like housing and equity.” But he said that the bill is likely to face “a lot of headwinds” in Congress, which we’re already starting to see signs of, and that passing such a bill is a “big if.” He advised the Biden administration to take the case out of the Beltway. “You’re not going to win this argument in Washington, D.C. You’re going to win it out in America.”
Rogoff also said he hopes that “not everything is negotiable” as Biden’s team gets ready to wheel and deal. And he pointed to a remarkable sentence in the bill that’s gone under the radar: "Every dollar spent on rebuilding our infrastructure during the Biden administration will be used to prevent, reduce, and withstand the impacts of the climate crisis."
RED LIGHT, GREEN LIGHT: The CDC updated its guidance for vaccinated Americans on Friday, saying that it’s safe for them to resume travel — but continued to recommend that it be avoided, citing the latest surge in cases. “We must balance this guidance with the fact that most Americans are still not vaccinated," said CDC director Rochelle Walensky, according to POLITICO’s Erin Banco.
On the surface, the agency’s statements could be interpreted as contradictory. But POLITICO health reporter David Lim summed up the logic neatly on Twitter: “Societal risk and individual risk are different. Travel is a low risk activity for fully vaccinated people. BUT inherently travel creates more interactions between people, including the not vaccinated public. So CDC is urging the public to not travel yet.”
The airline and travel industries have been waiting (and pushing) for this step. The U.S. Travel Association called the new guidance “a major step in the right direction that is supported by the science and will take the brakes off the industry that has been hardest hit by the fallout of COVID by far.” And Airlines for America had a similar reaction, noting that the industry is “especially pleased that the CDC study confirms those who are fully vaccinated are unlikely to transmit COVID-19 to others.”
SHOW ME THE MONEY: Our Tanya Snyder took a deep dive into how Amtrak is hoping to spend some of the $80 billion Biden proposed for rail in his infrastructure plan. Amtrak has been heavily promoting its ambitious cross-country expansion plan since the administration’s proposal was unveiled since last week and launched a new Twitter account for a new Amtrak Connects US marketing campaign Friday. Biden has yet to say just how much he wants to go to Amtrak, but the plan expressly says part of the money should be used to help Amtrak catch up on its $40 billion backlog of repairs, as well as for improvements along the Northeast Corridor and to “juice its most successful routes, among others,” Tanya writes.
Big dreams: But Amtrak has even more in mind, like serving 15 additional states with 30 or more new routes and increasing service on existing routes. “I think they’re reminding the White House and Congress, ‘Hey we are a receptacle for these funds, and we’re ready to spend it efficiently and quickly should the need arise,’” said Sean Jeans-Gail, vice president for policy and government affairs at the Rail Passengers Association. And Democrats can make changes to Amtrak’s existing programs to “expand the rail network” through the budgetary reconciliation process that they will likely have to use to get the funding enacted, he added.
ZERO TOLERANCE: Amtrak fired an employee who participated in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, according to Amtrak’s inspector general. “A company trackman was terminated from employment on March 31, 2021, after our investigation found he violated Amtrak policies by not reporting for his assigned shift thereby failing to attend to his duties, and by participating in the unauthorized entry of the Capitol building on January 6, 2021,” according to an investigative summary.
DIFFERENCES: The Federal Transit Administration has been slower to disburse CARES Act funds to rural and tribal communities than urban areas, Tanya reported. FTA officials said during a webinar Friday that the agency had disbursed 72 percent of funding to urbanized areas as of March 26. However, just 33 percent of the funds designated for rural areas and 26 percent of funds for tribal communities has been paid out, they said.
NO EASY CHOICES: Biden this week must decide whether to overturn an International Trade Commission decision that threatens to derail his dream of kick-starting the electric vehicle economy in the U.S., POLITICO's Gavin Bade reports. The ITC in February ruled that battery maker SK Innovation misappropriated trade secrets from rival South Korean firm LG Chem. SK says that if Biden does not overturn the decision by April 11, it will likely have to halt work on a $2.6 billion factory in Commerce, Ga.
Rock and a hard place: If Biden decides to overturn the decision, SK could finish the factory and he could brag about saving thousands of jobs in a key swing state. But it also would undermine intellectual property laws that the U.S. supports. And it would come as Biden resists calls from progressive lawmakers and activists to waive intellectual property restrictions on Covid-19 vaccines.
TAILPIPE LITIGATION PUT IN PARK: Despite procedural objections from states and environmentalists, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday granted the Biden administration's request to pause litigation over federal auto emissions and fuel economy standards. That will give the agencies time to rewrite the SAFE Vehicles rule that significantly scaled back federal tailpipe standards. The first status update from EPA and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is due to the court July 1 — the same month in which Biden has directed the agencies to issue a proposed revision.
Waymo CEO John Krafcik is stepping down, the company announced Friday. He will be replaced by Dmitri Dolgov and Tekedra Mawakana, who will serve as co-CEOs. Dolgov was previously Waymo’s chief technology officer, while Mawakana was the company’s chief operating officer.
— “Logjam deepens at the world's ports as pandemic strikes shipping.” AFP.
— “What the U.S. can learn from China‘s infatuation with infrastructure.“ The Wall Street Journal.
— “Travel is coming back. That‘s great news for airport stores.” CNN.
— “Biden's green energy plans clash with pledge to create union jobs.” POLITICO.
— “Wreckage of helicopter crash that killed 5 found on glacier.” The Associated Press.
— “A maglev would be a speedy option over protected land. But research and wildlife might suffer.” The Washington Post.
A message from SEIU:
President Biden’s plan to invest $400 billion in essential care infrastructure is a commitment to America’s future. It means millions of good union jobs for women of color and immigrant workers. It means accessible and affordable home care for all families — so our parents, grandparents and people with disabilities can live at home with dignity and independence. It means thriving, resilient communities.
Congress must meet the president’s commitment to invest in care infrastructure and care workers as a cornerstone of the American economy. Learn more and join us!
