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Tag: biden infrastructure
President Joe Biden

New Poll Shows Strong Support For Biden’s ‘Build Back Better’ Plan

Reprinted with permission from American Independent

Likely voters in 12 key states strongly back President Joe Biden's proposed $3.5 trillion "Build Back Better" investment plan, according to a new survey from left-leaning polling outfit Data for Progress. The new survey finds majority support for each of its top provisions, even in states whose GOP senators oppose the agenda.

Data for Progress released polling on Tuesday showing that voters in Arizona, Colorado, Georgia, Michigan, Montana, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Washington, West Virginia, and Wisconsin support Biden's Build Back Better plan by at least a 15-point margin.

The data showed support for increased taxes on the wealthy and corporations, expanded caregiving infrastructure, investment to curb climate change, and a pathway to citizenship for children brought to the United States illegally as children and other undocumented immigrants working in the country.

Voters in five of the states, all of which could play an important role in upcoming national elections, are represented by at least one Republican senator who has publicly attacked the legislation and voted against the budget resolution that will potentially allow the Senate to pass it by a simple majority. But their attacks do not appear to have swayed constituents.

"Montana families & business owners are feeling the pain of #Bidenflation as prices skyrocket from groceries & gas to cars & housing," Montana Sen. Steve Daines tweeted on Friday. "Yet Democrats are still planning another massive tax & spending spree that will only make things worse. It's reckless."

But Montana's likely voters back the $3.5 trillion plan 56 percent - 41 percent. They support its investments in long-term care (77 percent - 19 percent), expanded Medicare coverage (75 percent - 22 percent), tax cuts for families (60 percent -34 percent), child care (59 percent- 36 percent), universal pre-K (57 percent - 39 percent), paid leave (55 percent -22 percent), and clean energy (51 percent -45 percent).

They also back increasing taxes on wealthy Americans (64 percent - 34 percent) and corporations (57 percent - 42 percent) and a pathway to citizenship for immigrants (62 % - 35 percent).

Support for the plan was even higher in the other 11 states surveyed.

West Virginia Sen. Shelley Moore Capito tweeted, "The Democrats' reckless tax and spending spree will ultimately be paid for by the middle-class Americans they pretend to be protecting."

Pennsylvania Sen. Pat Toomey decried it as "massively excess spending" that would combine with inflation in "a recipe for serious problems."

Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina tweeted, "President Biden and Democrats are pushing a $3.5 trillion tax and spending spree that provides amnesty to millions while doing nothing to secure our border. Hard to imagine it getting even worse at the border, but their policies will encourage more illegal immigration."

And Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin tweeted, "The Democrats proposed $5.5 TRILLION tax & spending spree is reckless. You tax success, you're going to get less of it. We can't tax our way out of this. When will we get serious about controlling out-of-control spending?"

The legislation condemned by the GOP lawmakers is also highly popular among constituents of Sen. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona and Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, Democrats who have expressed some concern about the plan's price tag.

In addition to the immigration reform provisions, the Build Back Better package would incorporate elements of Biden's American Families Plan such as free community college, free preschool, expanded child tax credits, and paid leave, as well as clean energy and climate provisions from his American Jobs Plan. It would keep Biden's promise to raise taxes only on businesses and those earning more than $400,000 a year.

The recent polling results are consistent with those of earlier surveys that have shown public support for the investments and funding.

Still, every single Republican in Congress has opposed the plan.

Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.

Founder of Project Veritas James O'Keef

Far-Right Disinformation Outfit 'Project Veritas' Sunk By Hurricane Ida

Reprinted with permission from Daily Kos

The destructive flooding of Hurricane Ida as it hit the mainland U.S. has stretched from the Mississippi all the way up the Northeast of our country. The realities of our country's archaic infrastructure has even led to some GOP officials voicing their support for President Biden's infrastructure bill, which they've generally tried to neuter and delay for political gain. The costs in human misery and economic instability of doing nothing about climate change are far higher than the money we should be spending to upgrade our country's vast infrastructure needs.

Bad policy and unproductive political theater will not offer you immunity for defying science and forces like weather. Bad policy decisions concerning climate change and infrastructure hurt everyone. The Daily Beastreports that dirtbag conservative operator James O'Keefe and his Project Veritas crew lost their Mamaroneck, New York, home base to Ida's floods. Peas and carrots or thoughts and prayers, whichever one means less.

O'Keefe is probably best known for breaking the law and getting awards from Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas' terrible wife inside of a swampy Trump Hotel lobby for his work hiring women to create false sexual assault allegations in the hopes of discrediting real sexual assault allegations. Read that last part over to yourself again and then think about the kind of terrible hole in one's soul you have to have to be involved in that.

In a video posted to the right-wing disinformation group's YouTube channel, O'Keefe unironically says that Project Veritas' next "story" might be delayed as he works on rebuilding the organizations' infrastructure. In the video, O'Keefe calls himself and his "organization" the "most resilient organization anywhere," and then blathers on with a trite reference to the phoenix rising from the ashes. He finishes by misquoting a poem by Rudyard Kipling in sort of a perfect encapsulation of the conservative movement in our country: conjuring up an old famous imperialist, racist, and anti-Semite and then lacking the intelligence and thoroughness to even properly repeat his least offensive poetry.

Guess he'll be asking for some more of that socialist taxpayer money he and his buddies rail so hard against but love to have in the bank for a rainy day.

Senate vote of bipartisan infrastructure bill.

Biden’s Popular Infrastructure Bill Passes Senate Over GOP Opposition

Reprinted with permission from American Independent

The Senate passed a bipartisan bill on Tuesday to invest $550 billion in infrastructure. But most Republican senators voted against it.

The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act passed 69-30. All of the no votes came from Republicans.

The package will provide a historic investment in transportation, water systems, broadband, and electrical grid infrastructure.

In March, President Joe Biden proposed a $2.25 trillion American Jobs Plan, which included these and other infrastructure investments.

After months of negotiations, a group of 21 senators from both parties agreed in June on a framework for a bipartisan plan. Days later, Biden signed on.

Polls have shown the public strongly in support of the legislation. Large majorities of Democratic and independent voters backed the plan, as did a plurality of Republicans.

But one key Republican opposed it: former President Donald Trump.

Trump promised as a candidate in 2016 to invest in infrastructure and "build the next generation of roads, bridges, railways, tunnels, sea ports, and airports." Like many of his other pledges, he did not follow through— blowing up bipartisan negotiations to punish congressional Democrats for pursuing oversight of his administration.

On July 26, Trump warned Senate Republicans not to give "the Radical Left Democrats a big and beautiful win on Infrastructure" by passing the bipartisan package.

Two days later, he threatened that if the Senate GOP gives "a victory for the Biden Administration and Democrats," he and his followers will "never forget" and "lots of primaries will be coming your way!"

After those warnings, two of the Republicans who helped negotiated the deal flip-flopped and came out against it: Indiana Sen. Todd Young and South Dakota Sen. Mike Rounds. Rounds missed the vote for family reasons.

The bill now moves to the House of Representatives.

Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.

Sen. Josh Hawley

Hawley Seeks To Strip Federal Funding From Schools With Mask Mandates

Reprinted with permission from American Independent

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) wants to strip school districts of federal funding if they require students to wear masks or get the COVID-19 vaccine — even as the delta variant continues to tear through the country.

Hawley announced on Monday that he will introduce measures to restrict funding to schools over COVID safety precautions as part of 15 amendments he wants to tack to the budget resolution Democrats released earlier that day. Democrats are hoping to use the budget resolution to pass a major infrastructure bill that includes many of President Joe Biden's priorities.

Hawley's proposals come as states across the country are seeing a surge of COVID-19 cases, thanks to the highly contagious delta variant.

Cases among children have skyrocketed, with the American Academy of Pediatrics announcing on August 5 they've seen a "substantial increase" in the number of children contracting the virus.

Doctors in hotspots including Florida and Louisiana — which are currently experiencing the worst outbreaks in the country — say they are seeing more and more children admitted to hospitals and intensive care units.

But Republican lawmakers like Hawley have been fighting efforts that public health experts say can end the pandemic.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy let slip that nearly one-third of Republicans in his caucus have refused to get the COVID-19 vaccine at all. And many House Republicans are also against wearing masks.

Doctors say masks are especially important now for kids ages 11 and under, as they are currently ineligible to receive the vaccine and thus do not have immunity.

It looks unlikely that Hawley's amendments will pass, as Democrats have a majority in the Senate.

However, Florida's GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis has already threatened schools that require masks, saying they could risk state education funding for implementing the policy. Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott has made similar threats, saying that schools or businesses that require masks could risk fines.

Major school districts are already defying both DeSantis and Abbott, announcing mask requirements amid the surge of COVID-19 cases.

The Dallas Independent School District on Monday announced that it will require all students, staff, and visitors to wear masks in order "to protect staff and students from the spread of the highly contagious Delta variant of the coronavirus."

And a handful of school districts in Florida are also defying DeSantis' ban on mask requirements, including Leon County schools, which includes Florida's capital of Tallahassee. Cases there are skyrocketing, and intensive care unit beds are nearly all full, according to data from the New York Times.

Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.