Source: United States Senator Kevin Cramer (R-ND)
WASHINGTON — U.S. Senator Kevin Cramer (R-ND), Ranking Member of the Senate Environment and Public Works (EPW) Subcommittee on Transportation and Infrastructure, joined Dagen McDowell on Fox Business this morning to discuss the path forward for bipartisan infrastructure package negotiations. Excerpts and the full interview are below.
On the Latest Hold Up:
“There’s some top line numbers that [Democrats] are raising … that have been settled and should be settled, and we’re down to a few simple things. … You’re talking about large numbers that we want to get exactly right before we bring [the bill] to the floor.”
On the Merits of a Bipartisan Package:
“[Republicans] didn’t win enough elections to be able to dictate all of the terms. On balance, what this looks to me like is it looks like a pretty fair deal.”
“Infrastructure is counter-inflationary. It actually builds up the supply side of the economy, so in many respects you’re right we would be helping Democrats, I suppose, because we’re helping some of their inflationary actions, but that’s what we’re here for. We’re not here to just say ‘no’ to everything. We’re here to try to make things better.”
On the Path Forward:
“The Senate is a very deliberative body, a transactional body. It’s a 50-50 shared power and structure here, so it takes a long time to do big things, and our Founders wanted it that way. We’re talking about spending a trillion dollars, for crying out loud. It should take a while.”
“At the end of the day, we’ll have a proposal that has as its primary purpose the productivity of the United States economy, and it will pay people to work, as opposed to not work. It’s not everything we want but a good deal of what we want, and it’s good for our country.”