Buttigieg: Democrats Near ‘Fish or Cut Bait Moment’ on Infrastructure Negotiations

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union” that Democrats were near ending negotiations with Republican lawmakers and going it alone to push through President Joe Biden’s infrastructure package.

Anchor Jake Tapper said, “Are you basically saying that in the next week if there isn’t an agreement, Democrats are going to go it alone?”

Buttigieg said, “I think we are getting pretty close to a fish or cut bait moment, but I’ll tell you on the fishing side of things, the negotiations have been healthy. There’s a lot of conversations going on. Among members of Congress who have come forward with a lot of different ideas and discussions, we’ve had with a group led by the Senator from West Virginia. So we believe in this process but also very much agree this can’t go on forever. The American people want results. We are 13th place in infrastructure as a country now and probably headed in the wrong direction. Seeing losses to this day. Not just things you count up in industry group reports of the billions lost when we have port backups, just individual families paying hundreds of bucks a year in the so-called pothole tax. Invisible cost of wear and tear on our vehicles when roads aren’t in good shape. This can’t go on in terms of condition of our infrastructure. Therefore, negotiations can’t go on forever either.”

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