The impeachment fight raging between House Democrats and the White House may stall progress on one of the more promising bipartisan issues in Washington: infrastructure.
Republicans and Democrats have signaled a willingness to work together in recent history. The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee unanimously approved a $287 billion highway funding bill in July. In April, President Trump met with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, agreeing to a $2 trillion infrastructure spending plan. Left out of the discussion was how Congress would pay for it.
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Impeachment has raised tensions between the White House and Democrats just months after special counsel Robert Mueller finished his two-year investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.
Critical deadlines are looming for federal infrastructure investment. A five-year highway law expires in September 2020 and requires congressional reauthorization to continue. The Highway Trust Fund disburses funding for most major national highway construction and maintenance projects across the country. It is on track to run out of funds in the next two to three years.
On top of the fixed deadlines and looming insolvency of crucial programs, infrastructure in the United States continues to age and deteriorate while repairs have slowed.
In 2018, the repair rate of bridges hit the slowest pace in five years, according to the American Road and Transportation Builders Association. Accidents involving public transit rose by 13% from 2015 to 2018, and the amount of damage done to property because of those incidents rose by 20% over the same period, according to the National Transit Database.
Democrats have spoken openly about tending to legislative priorities on one hand while cranking the impeachment gear with the other. Asked how she plans to succeed at the balancing act, Pelosi said in an Oct. 2 press conference that “they have nothing to do with each other.”
“We have a responsibility to uphold our oath of office to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. We also have a responsibility to get the job done for the American people,” Pelosi said.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell made a similar pledge days earlier in a Sept. 30 interview with CNBC.
“We’re going to do a transportation bill, maybe later this year,” McConnell said. “It probably won’t be as bold as the president was talking about, because it would inevitably, if it were that bold, involve a whopping gasoline tax increase which is very regressive, it hits medium and low-income people very hard.”
While politicians pay lip service for continuing bipartisanship, they may be downplaying the reality of how large, highly partisan fights such as impeachment affect Capitol Hill. Pelosi says legislation and congressional investigations into the president are separate issues to pursue at the same time. But her track record balancing the two has yet to yield any significant results.
After Trump met with Pelosi and Schumer in April, the trio’s $2 trillion infrastructure deal fell apart after Pelosi accused Trump of engaging in a “cover-up” in the Russian collusion investigation. The president responded later that day and said he was cutting off talks with Democratic leaders.
“You probably can’t go down two tracks. You can go down the investigative track, and you can go down the investment track,” Trump said. “I want to do infrastructure. I want to do it more than you want to do it. I’d be really good at that, that’s what I do. But you know what? You can’t do it under these circumstances.”
Reports suggest that Democrats want a quick resolution to the impeachment process. Moderate Democrats holding seats Trump won in 2016 are pushing Pelosi to keep the impeachment inquiry focused. They’d prefer the proceedings wrap up by the end of the year to give several months for voters’ passions to cool before Election Day.
Any chance of Congress passing meaningful legislation on infrastructure between now and Election Day may rest on moderate Democrats getting their way.
