02.12.18

Grijalva on Trump’s Infrastructure Plan

Washington, D.C. – Ranking Member Raúl M. Grijalva (D-Ariz.) responded to the release of President Trump’s “infrastructure plan” that aims to gut fundamental clean water and air protections and puts our children’s health at risk:

“This is not a plan, it’s not even a proposal. This is a sheet of tired, Republican talking points that blame everything on basic environmental protections and in the end, do nothing,” Grijalva said. “Local communities, not big corporate developers who solely care about profits, should have a voice in where a road or highway should go. If Trump’s plan is wholeheartedly focused on bettering the lives of the American people, then they shouldn’t be silenced in the process.” 

“Using our environmental planning laws to think about highways and bridges before we build them saves us money in the long run and allows communities to have a voice in the planning process. Democrats have proposed real solutions – with real funding – not these same old stale bumper sticker slogans.”

The infrastructure plan would hand over large sums of taxpayer money to big corporations to build roads, bridges, highways and more, but when it comes to the management of our public lands the administration is looking for low-cost solutions. The plan proposes to hand over our public lands and waters to Big Oil and use a small fraction of the resulting revenues to address the growing National Park Service backlog.

“This is a cynical attempt to push for vastly expanded oil and gas drilling by essentially holding the parks hostage. The administration is pushing for drilling right up against the borders of national parks, so unless you’d like to be able to sit on a beautiful new bench right outside a visitor’s center to admire the fracking jobs and pump jacks just a few hundred feet away, then Trump’s plan is a total flop,” Grijalva concluded.

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