Transportation secretary Elaine Chao told the Chamber of Commerce Monday that the Trump administration will unveil its infrastructure plan in the “next several weeks,” the latest such estimate from a top official in recent days for one of the president’s most touted priorities.
Chao said the release will “kick off our collaboration with Congress”—what is sure to be a contentious process, based on the unusual partisan politics of the issue and the White House’s early difficulties pushing its legislative agenda.
“We are fortunate to have a president who understands the challenges of infrastructure, perhaps better than any other leader in recent memory,” Chao said.
Chao predicted in early April that the plan would “probably” come sometime in May. But the American Health Care Act stalled, and the White House wound up announcing some principles of its tax package later in the month. Throughout this period, a separate administration aide for infrastructure policy, DJ Gribbin, stated the timing of the plan was “still a little bit up in the air;” about a week later, White House budget director Mick Mulvaney said the plan wouldn’t be ready until the fall. It was in “early discussions,” he said on April 20. He did put a price tag on it, though: $200 billion of spending, with the possible goal of leveraging that money into $1 trillion of investment. President Trump has cited the latter number since the presidential campaign.
Chao reiterated broad points about the plan and the administration’s undertakings to-date: It has been a collaborative project across 16 federal agencies, and has included input from non-federal officials. “It’s important to hear from this myriad of stakeholders and not repeat the mistakes of the past,” Chao, a former transportation official in the Reagan and Bush administrations, said Monday. The proposal will also try sparking private investment—the “ample capital” Chao said she has been told by investors is available—and lowering barriers to construction, like lengthy permitting and approval processes. As Gribbin noted in April, the hard substance will be based on a “very broad” definition of infrastructure.
