Nancy Pelosi Pushes Passage of Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill House Floor Speech Transcript

Speaker 1: (00:01) Speaker is recognized. Nancy Pelosi: (00:02) Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I thank the gentleman for yielding, and more importantly, I thank him for his tremendous leadership, his understanding of infrastructure in our country. The way to build it in a green way to honor our commitment to our children is something that is a blessing to the Congress. For decades, he has served on the Transportation Infrastructure Committee, and he has done so in a way that has taken us into the future. But we haven't had a bill in a while, and so I thank him for his invest bill that he had earlier that is not all reflected here, but nonetheless, hopefully we'll see some provisions in the Build Back Better Act. Nancy Pelosi: (00:46) I rise in support of the bipartisan infrastructure bill, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which is about jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs. Support for this legislation is bipartisan, bicameral, and respectful of the needs of workers and communities across the country. Nancy Pelosi: (01:06) Following the vision of President Biden, the bipartisan [inaudible 00:01:10] addresses a great need in America, which has been neglected for decades, as I mentioned. Our roads, bridges, and water systems are crumbling. Some water systems are over 100 years old, Mr. Speaker, made a brick and wood. Our electric grid system is vulnerable to catastrophic outages. We must not only build the infrastructure for the 21st century economy, we must rebuild the middle class, creating good paying American jobs and turbocharging American competitiveness and growth. These are connected. These are connected. Nancy Pelosi: (01:45) Again, thanks again to President Biden. He said, "I am happy to work in a bipartisan way in order to have an infrastructure bill where we come to agreement. But I will not confine my vision to that piece, that legislative piece. We must build back better." And I think it's very important to note for people across the country who have seen infrastructure in the past come in and divide their communities, perpetuate injustices, environmental injustice in their communities, that it is necessary for us to build back better in a way that empowers women. When I say build a middle class, it's about jobs, but it's about jobs in a new way, more inclusive for women, for people of color, for younger people to be engaged and trained with workforce training, to participate in the new economy with jobs and justice. Nancy Pelosi: (02:43) In the past, our infrastructure bills have reinforced that environmental injustice and divided communities. The Build Back Better will undo that. But the passage of this bill accompanied by the Build Back Better legislation with its equity piece, all of that injustice ... Well, much of that injustice much, as possible will be reversed. Nancy Pelosi: (03:04) It's about building up. It's not about trickle down. "Oh, this is what we're going to do and a lot of people will benefit and maybe you'll get some of it." No, it's about meeting the needs of people, both for the water needs or transportation needs or infrastructure needs in many ways, but also that starts and then builds up. Nancy Pelosi: (03:25) Along with the Build Back Better Act, this prioritizes some aspects of justice and opportunity, helping assure that ... Okay, let me be clear. While the investments in the bipartisan infrastructure bill are strong, historic down payments for Build Back Better, we are not confining our vision, as the President has said he's not confining his, for rebuilding infrastructure to this legislation. Nancy Pelosi: (03:53) We all know that we have to build back in a responsible way to meet our green climate initiatives and our goals and our responsibilities in that regard. Passing an infrastructure is always exciting for what it means in terms of jobs and taking our country into the future. And it's always been bipartisan over the years here, not for a while because there was resistance. When President Obama was President, we passed a bill, but it was not of this magnitude that we needed. Nancy Pelosi: (04:24) This is a step closer to a once in a generation investment in our infrastructure, as the conference of mayors have said, and now we must go further to build back better. With that, I urge a strong bipartisan support for this legislation and yield back the balance of my time. Thank you.