Biden touts Pittsburgh bridge as infrastructure win
PITTSBURGH — Nine months ago, a Pennsylvania bridge became a symbol of the nation’s troubled infrastructure when it collapsed just hours before President Joe Biden visited it. On Thursday, Biden was back to check out the repair work now underway.
His visit was part of his efforts to showcase his administration’s efforts to revitalize the nation’s roadways. The stop at Fern Hollow Bridge, which collapsed into a ravine in January, was part of the president’s latest road trip to sell White House accomplishments in the runup to midterms elections, less than three weeks away.
Administration officials say the repair job, expected to be finished by December, was accelerated by passage of a bipartisan infrastructure law that Biden signed late last year. Biden had diverted from his planned itinerary last January to visit the site of the just-collapsed bridge.
On Thursday, he returned to the bridge to turn it into a symbol of success for the White House and Democrats, who count the bipartisan law as one of several achievements during the first two years of Biden's presidency.
“When you see these projects in your neighborhoods and cranes going up, shovels in the ground, I want you to feel the way I feel: Pride,” Biden said, speaking next to a tall, yellow crane at the edge of the new span of Fern Hollow. “Pride in what we can do when we work together.”
He added: “Instead of infrastructure week — which was a punchline for four years under my predecessor — it’s infrastructure decade, a headline on my watch.”
The legislation is one of Biden’s successes from the first two years of his term, and he repeatedly emphasizes its impact while traveling the country to roadways, airplane terminals and seaports. Out of roughly $1 trillion in spending, about $40 billion is dedicated to bridges.
“We’ve made tremendous progress,” said Mitch Landrieu, a senior White House adviser tasked with overseeing spending and implementation of the massive infrastructure bill. Landrieu said the funding for the swift repair came in part because of the infrastructure law funding going to the state. “We have actually rebuilt this bridge within a year.”
“The president is standing in the breach and actually demonstrating with historic legislation that he’s passed, that his choices are different and better for the country.”
The Biden administration has sought to increase the pace of building infrastructure projects, hosting a summit last week at the White House to help state and local government officials streamline their processes.
The push to speed up the permitting, design and construction process has come as high inflation has pushed up costs and caused delays. The Commerce Department has an initiative to coordinate the installation of water pipes and broadband and power lines to avoid tearing up roads multiple times. Also, the Transportation Department launched an internal center to advise on best practices for construction.
John Fetterman, the Democrat running for the U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania, was on hand when Biden visited the Pittsburgh bridge. Biden thanked Fetterman — currently the state's lieutenant governor — for his candidacy and told his wife, Gisele, “You’re going to be a great, great lady in the Senate.”
“This law’s about more than rebuilding our infrastructure, it’s about rebuilding the middle class — something John knows a lot about and talks a lot about,” Biden said during his remarks.
The Fettermans later accompanied Biden to a Primanti Bros. sandwich shop in nearby Moon Township, where the president paid for several bags of takeout food and, in a brief exchange with reporters, expressed confidence that Democrats would retain control of the Senate.
“It ain’t over until it’s over,” Biden said of his party's prospects in the Senate.
Earlier Thursday, Biden, before boarding his helicopter on the White House South Lawn, challenged a reporter who suggested that few Democratic candidates have done events with him ahead of the midterm elections.
“That’s not true,” Biden responded. “There have been 15. Count, kid, count.” He later told reporters in Moon Township that he has received several requests from Democratic candidates to campaign but he did not yet have details.
After the bridge, Biden made his way to Philadelphia where he spoke at a fundraiser in an attempt to boost Fetterman’s campaign for senate.
At the event, the president said that the “rest of the world is looking” to see who holds control of Congress after the upcoming midterm elections.
Biden sounded the alarm about what he viewed as the urgency of the moment, saying Republicans are trying to roll back access to abortion and raise the price of prescription drugs. He seized on comments by some GOP lawmakers, including House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, casting doubt on the U.S. commitment to help Ukraine fend off Russia's invasion of its territory.
“They said that if they win they’re not likely to fund, to continue to fund Ukraine," Biden said. “These guys don’t get it. It’s a lot bigger than Ukraine. It’s Eastern Europe. It’s NATO. It’s really serious, serious, consequential outcomes.”
