President Donald Trump announced Tuesday that he will ask Congress to approve a $1 trillion infrastructure bill, a push that would make good on a key campaign pledge.
“To launch our national rebuilding, I will be asking the Congress to approve legislation that produces a $1 trillion investment in the infrastructure of the United States — financed through both public and private capital — creating millions of new jobs,” Trump said, noting that the effort will be guided by his “Buy American and Hire American” principle.
Trump invoked Dwight D. Eisenhower in his call for infrastructure spending.
“Another Republican President, Dwight D. Eisenhower, initiated the last truly great national infrastructure program — the building of the interstate highway system. The time has come for a new program of national rebuilding,” he said.
And in this call, Trump knocked the amount of money spent in foreign wars.
“America has spent approximately $6 trillion in the Middle East, all this while our infrastructure at home is crumbling. With this $6 trillion we could have rebuilt our country — twice. And maybe even three times if we had people who had the ability to negotiate,” he said, eliciting a laugh from House Speaker Paul Ryan.
As Democrats gird for a fight with Trump on a host of topics, infrastructure may be one area with bipartisan agreement. Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, the liberal icon who ran for president against Hillary Clinton in 2016, also ran on the pledge to spend $1 trillion on infrastructure.