Buttigieg Says ‘There’s A Very Good Chance’ Infrastructure Plan Gets Republican Support After Initial Talks Collapse

On Wednesday, Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg expressed optimism that bipartisan negotiations in the Senate will yield Republican support for an infrastructure package sought by the White House.

Speaking with Wolf Blitzer one day after the Biden administration ended infrastructure negotiations with a group of Republicans led by Sen. Shelley Capito (WV), Buttigieg said, “At this point I would say there are multiple pathways to get to where we need to go.”

In order to pass the Senate through regular order, an infrastructure bill would need to receive 60 votes. In this scenario if every Democrat voted yes, they’d still need 10 Republicans to cross the aisle. Failing that, Democrats might attempt to pass the bill through budget reconciliation, which would require a simple majority.

“There’s going to be a bit of a winding road here,” the Transportation Secretary said. “But the bottom line is this: we cannot fail to act.”

Blitzer asked Buttigieg where negotiations in the Senate stand now.

“What’s going on now,” said Buttigieg, “is the president still believes we need to do something big, and we need to do something now. We’re seeing one other bipartisan group. The president has talked to some of those members that include Senator Cassidy, Manchin, Sinema, I think Senator Romney has spoken about some conversations going on. So a lot going on. We haven’t seen numbers.”

Despite the total lack of dollar figures from the bipartisan group, Buttigieg said he thinks there’s “a very good chance” at least some Republicans will support whatever bill is eventually put forward. He did not specify how many.

Buttigieg stressed that the president thinks “we need to do something big.”

“Something that nibbles on the edge is not good enough for the president.”

Watch above via CNN.