WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Rep. Blake Moore (R-1st District) is defending his vote against a $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill that will include funding for many needed projects in Utah.

“I am fully supportive of a targeted and fiscally sound infrastructure package,” Moore explained after the House vote on Nov. 5. “But Democrats are using passage of this infrastructure bill as a way to help internally advance their egregious $1.75 trillion tax and spend package.”

The controversial infrastructure package passed the House with a floor vote 228 to 206. Thirteen GOP representatives abandoned party loyalty to vote in favor of the package. Moore and Utah’s other three representatives in the House were not among them.

Since the proposal originated in the Senate, where it was supported by Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah), the measure is now on its way to President Joe Biden’s desk where it could be signed within days.

Romney sees enactment of the infrastructure bill to be good news for Utah, as it will fund drought relief and other critical water needs; mitigation of wildfires; improved transportation networks; and, extension of broadband capability to rural areas.

The rest of Utah’s congressional delegation disagrees.

Democrats – including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Biden — are touting the passage of the infrastructure bill as a major milestone toward enactment of their $1.75 trillion budget reconciliation bill for Fiscal Year 2022. On strictly party-line votes, both the House and Senate have given initial approval of that measure, but a single Democrat‘s vote in the Senate or three in the House could derail final consent for that proposal.

The reconciliation proposal began early in 2021 as a $3.5 trillion Democratic wish list that Biden dubbed his Build Back Better (BBB) plan. That plan has since been cut in half to earn congressional support.

That draft proposal still includes more than $500 billion to address climate change, $400 billion for universal pre-school, $316 billion for health care, $200 billion for child tax credits and $150 billion for affordable housing.

But Moore predicts that the BBB plan includes provisions that will hurt Utah businesses, lower wages, export jobs abroad and consolidate power in Washington.

“I simply cannot take the risk that my vote for this infrastructure bill in the House would help advance Speaker Pelosi’s fiscal tragedy in any way,” he explains. “The reconciliation package amounts to our country’s largest ever spending and tax increase. It is full of mandates that move our country backward, not forward.

“Undisciplined spending threatens our national security, raises prices, taxes the working class and destroys jobs,” Moore adds. “The reconciliation bill mindlessly dumps billions of dollars into aged government programs that we already know aren’t working. It dangerously expands the size and scope of the federal government at the expense of the state of Utah, funds abortions with taxpayer money and raises taxes on job creators and Utah families.

“I believe that Congress must be much more thoughtful as we help ensure all Americans have opportunities to succeed,” Moore emphasizes. “”I will continue to fight for innovative, dynamic and responsible federal spending to tackle the challenges that lie ahead.”



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