Several members of President Joe Biden’s Cabinet went before the Senate Appropriations Committee on Tuesday in the first of many hearings on Biden’s $2.3 trillion infrastructure plan. Republican U.S. Sen. Susan Collins of Maine said she was not satisfied with their answers to her questions.
With the Senate evenly divided, every senator has more influence than usual, and Collins has expressed her support for a substantial infrastructure bill. But she said the Biden plan as proposed goes well beyond what she considers to be infrastructure, such as job training programs and climate change research.
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“There is a lot to be done, but some of the priorities in the president’s bill go far beyond infrastructure,” she said.
Collins said only $982 billion of the president’s plan goes for what she considers infrastructure, such as roads, bridges, ports, airports and broadband. She said a bipartisan group of Senators are meeting later this week to try and get a compromise on three key areas, what infrastructure items will be in the package, the overall cost and how to pay for the package.
This article appears through a media partnership with Maine Public.