Senate Passes Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill

On Tuesday, the Senate passed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), a bipartisan package to invest more than $1 trillion to meet America’s growing transportation and infrastructure needs. The package included a five-year reauthorization of the surface transportation programs as well as more than $550 billion in additional infrastructure spending. The IIJA embodies the reauthorization and infrastructure investment priorities of the NRMCA Government Affairs Committee: it provides robust funding, is a five-year  investment, and was produced and passed in a bipartisan manner.

The bipartisan bill contains a number of NRMCA priorities, including designated funding for roads and bridges, designated funding for major projects, an exemption for aggregates, cement, asphalt, binders and additives from new Buy America procurement standards, a pilot program for the DRIVE-Safe Act and environmental permitting reforms instituted by the Trump Administration. Further, the bill leaves out many of the policies from the House surface reauthorization that NRMCA opposed. The bill does not increase minimum truck insurance, does not roll back Hours of Service rules, does not mandate new sleep apnea regulations, does not limit states’ ability to construct new capacity and does not include anti-business labor policies like the PRO Act. Finally, unlike many of the proposed pay-fors in President Biden’s American Jobs Act, the IIJA does not raise the corporate tax rate, does not tax capital gains and does not include a step-up in basis for estate taxes.

NRMCA joined a host of business and construction industry groups in supporting this important legislation, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, America’s Road and Transportation Builders’ Association, the Associated General Contractors, the National Stone, Sand & Gravel Association and the Portland Cement Association.

The bill faces an uncertain future in the House of Representatives where Speaker Pelosi has indicated that she will not bring the bipartisan infrastructure bill up for a vote until the Senate passes and sends over its $3.5 trillion reconciliation package. The outline for the reconciliation package was released on Monday. You can view it here.

The Senate passed the budget resolution – the legislative vehicle that provides for the reconciliation package – late Tuesday night and adjourned for the traditional August state work period. However, while all 50 senators who caucus with the Democrats are likely to support the budget resolution, several have indicated that they will not support final passage of a $3.5 trillion reconciliation package. Congressional committees are likely to work on this legislation through August and could have a reconciliation package ready by mid-September.

On Tuesday, the House announced that it would return to Washington the week of August 23 and will likely consider a budget resolution.

TAKE ACTION: Now is the time to make your voice heard. We need to urge every Member of Congress to support the important bipartisan infrastructure bill – and we need the president to lend his voice in support of passage. Click here to send a message to the House of Representatives and the president.

For more information, contact Andrew Tyrrell at atyrrell@nrmca.org.