Trump Says Infrastructure Overhaul Will Likely Have To Wait Until After Midterms

It’s an admission rooted in political reality and the congressional calendar.
President Donald Trump delivers remarks on the Infrastructure Initiative at the Local 18 Richfield Training Site in Richfield, Ohio, March 29, 2018.
President Donald Trump delivers remarks on the Infrastructure Initiative at the Local 18 Richfield Training Site in Richfield, Ohio, March 29, 2018.
Yuri Gripas / Reuters

President Donald Trump’s long-stalled infrastructure package is unlikely to happen until after November’s midterm elections, he acknowledged Thursday.

“We’ll probably have to wait until after the election,” Trump said in Richfield, Ohio, during what administration officials billed as a major speech on infrastructure.

It was an admission rooted in political reality and the congressional calendar. Lawmakers are mostly done legislating for the year and are looking to focus on the November elections. Republican leaders, in particular, have been dubious about the prospect of passing another massive spending package.

Trump’s infrastructure proposal, which the White House unveiled earlier this year, seeks to leverage $200 billion in direct federal spending over the next decade into an additional $1.3 trillion for infrastructure development with the aid of state and local tax dollars as well as private investment. The administration has not proposed a way to pay for the initiative.

If there is to be any compromise between Republicans and Democrats on infrastructure, it’ll likely only happen after the election, retiring House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman Bill Shuster (R-Pa.) said last month.

“It could be a lame-duck strategy, that we do it after the election,” Shuster said.

In his speech on Thursday, which touched on not only infrastructure but seemingly every other subject as well, including actress Roseanne Barr and her television show, Trump touted new funding Congress had approved for highways, airports, railroads, and waterways. Those funds were included in a $1.3 trillion budget package he signed earlier this month ― a measure he’d called “ridiculous” and had initially threatened to veto.

Trump also suggested to Congress that his infrastructure plan doesn’t necessarily have to be taken up in one piece.

“It can be passed in one bill, or in a series of measures,” he said. “What matters is that we get the job done.”

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