Congress has passed a $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill, delivering on a major pillar of President Joe Biden's domestic agenda after months of internal deliberations and painstaking divisions among Democrats.
The legislation that passed Friday night will deliver $550 billion of new federal investments in America's infrastructure over five years, including money for roads, bridges, mass transit, rail, airports, ports and waterways. The package includes a $65 billion investment in improving the nation's broadband infrastructure, and invests tens of billions of dollars in improving the electric grid and water systems. Another $7.
After hours of negotiating, the House finally moved forward to send the infrastructure bill to Biden's desk, despite opposition from progressives who had warned that they would sink the infrastructure bill if it moved ahead without the separate economic package. Even though Jayapal's statement brought a significant number of progressives onboard, there were still six progressive holdouts who stuck to their original plan of voting against infrastructure until the social spending plan also received a final vote. The brokered deal between Jayapal and moderates did peel off a significant number of progressives from the vote down infrastructure camp, as that number was as high as 20 at one point during the day on Friday.
The President separately called into a meeting of the Progressive Caucus itself and spoke on speakerphone to the members, according to two sources familiar with the call, pushing a vote on the infrastructure bill. Biden also scrapped his travel to Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, on Friday night as initially planned, according to a White House official, as he continues to push for a path forward on advancing his agenda.
Rep. Mark Pocan, former chair of the progressive caucus, described today on the Hill colorfully, telling reporters,"Well, the whole day was a clusterf***, right?""Everyone is anxious to get this done," another member said."There's growing frustration that the Blue Dogs keep moving the goal post. Every time we get close, they come up with a new demand." The Blue Dog Coalition is a group of centrist House Democrats.