Although six House Democrats from the progressive wing of the party voted against passage of the $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi passed the bill late Friday night with the help of 13 Republicans. Hidden inside the 2,300 pages of this complete boondoggle of a bill are numerous dangerous provisions that would have our founders rolling in their graves.
Shortly before the vote, House Minority Whip Steve Scalise of Louisiana warned colleagues about several of the most egregious initiatives contained in this legislation.
Scalise, holding up a copy of the unwieldy bill that lawmakers had only received the night before, reminded his colleagues of Biden’s promise that passage of his agenda would not cost Americans earning under $400,000 one dime.
“He breaks the promise right here,” Scalise said. “In the bill, a tax, according to the American Gas Association, will increase household electricity rates by 30 percent. And by the way, that’s low-income families that pay that tax the hardest.”
Democrats had originally put amnesty for illegal immigrants into their larger Build Back Better bill. Because there is no Republican support in the Senate for this legislation, they hoped to pass it through the process of reconciliation.
However, in September, Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth McDonough ruled that amnesty could not be included in a reconciliation bill because it has nothing to do with either spending or revenue. So they added it to the infrastructure bill instead.
Scalise told colleagues: “Millions of additional people will get amnesty in this bill. And it comes at a time where President Biden is negotiating — initially he said he wasn’t — and then the White House had to go back up and say the Justice Department is negotiating half a million dollar checks to people who came across our border illegally and then they’re going to give amnesty to millions more people. Estimates are seven million more people.”
“Can you imagine the flood that will come over when they hear that you can get a half a million dollars a person if President Biden gets his way?” he adds.
Scalise was referring to reports that the Departments of Justice, Homeland Security, and Health and Human Services are in talks to give $450,000 per person to immigrants who were separated from family members at the border during the Trump Administration. Questioned about these payments by Fox News’ Peter Doocy last week, Biden said the story wasn’t true. He was later “corrected” by White House officials who confirmed that negotiations are ongoing.
Next, he addressed the addition of 87,000 IRS agents. “They call this infrastructure. They call this equity. Whatever they want to call it, it’s an army of IRS agents that are going to comb through your bank account. … Why? Because they’ve got to generate hundreds of billions of dollars to spend on more inflation-inducing spending. …”
“According to this Penn-Wharton account [a budget model], you’re going to have over $4 trillion of spending with $1.5 trillion of new taxes. By the way, that’s $2.5 trillion of additional debt. The President says there’s no cost – no cost, just … $2.5 trillion of debt.”
“These IRS agents are going to have to account for over $200 billion to find money from your checking accounts,” he said. “That’s what they’re trying to do at dark of night.”
“No wonder they don’t want a CBO score [on this bill], no wonder they want to do this by dark of night. This is going to induce more inflation that’s hurting families all across America,” Scalise said.
In this bill Dems are trying to ram through:
– Mass amnesty
– 87,000 new IRS agents
– Insane leftist mandates
– Giveaways to union bosses
– Natural gas tax that’ll raise energy costsIt’s a socialist takeover of America.
No wonder they’re doing it in the dark of night. pic.twitter.com/bvZ4v4BJ23
— Steve Scalise (@SteveScalise) November 6, 2021
Scalise listed two additional items in his Twitter post that time would not allow him to cover in his floor speech. The first was giveaways to union bosses.
According to the Labor Department, “Davis-Bacon Act and Related Act contractors and subcontractors must pay their laborers and mechanics employed under the contract no less than the locally prevailing wages and fringe benefits for corresponding work on similar projects in the area.” Locally prevailing wages are set by the Labor Department.
A White House fact sheet states that “the overwhelming majority of the funds in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act will be subject to Davis-Bacon requirements. … These requirements will protect wages for millions of workers, grow the economy, and support good-paying, union jobs.” (Emphasis mine.)
Stand for America has warned that tying federally funded infrastructure projects to the Davis-Bacon Act will make these projects substantially more expensive and will put unions at a distinct advantage to win these coveted government construction projects. They explain that “it’s mainly unionized companies that pay prevailing wage salaries, so they’re more likely to be chosen for federally-funded construction projects.”
According to their report, “Under Davis-Bacon, the government jacks up required wages. Studies show that prevailing wages can drive the costs of projects 20% higher than market cost. As of just a few years ago, carpenters’ prevailing wages in Nassau-Suffolk, New York, were 30% above market. Electricians and plumbers’ prevailing wages were 45.5% and 58.7% above market, respectively.”
The organization also discusses the union giveaways included in the Build Back Better bill, which they said are even worse.
The final grievance on Scalise’s list was “insane left mandates.” The bill contains an abundance of insane left mandates, so I’m not exactly sure which ones he had in mind.
I imagine he was referring to the legislation’s aggressive climate-change measures. Yahoo’s senior climate editor — yes, they have a climate editor — calls the spending in this bill alone “the largest climate change investment in U.S. history.”
For example, it includes $150 billion for clean energy advancement. This is a mere drop in the bucket when one considers Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen’s mind-boggling estimate of $100 to $150 trillion over the next 30 years to reach “net-zero” emissions. She delivered this stunning figure in her remarks to COP26 attendees last week. ZeroHedge had the story.
No need to worry, though. Yellen has assured us that this represents the “greatest economic opportunity” of our lives.
Scalise is right. None of these items are good for America. All are intended to move the country closer to becoming a socialist state.
The passage of the reconciliation bill would bring us to the brink. Let’s hope Sen. Joe Manchin, a moderate Democrat from West Virginia who has thus far withheld his tie-breaking support, either blocks it, which may be too much to hope for, or at least takes the most dangerous provisions out of the final bill.
This administration represents the greatest national security threat America faces today.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
