Democrats are unenthused.<\/b>
\nDuring his campaign, Donald Trump promised to spend $1 trillion on an infrastructure program that he likened to those of the New Deal era. When Hillary Clinton called for $275 billion in infrastructure investment, the Republican nominee vowed to spend at least twice that sum.
Last month, the White House released a budget that allocated $200 billion for spurring public-private partnerships in infrastructure investment \u2014 while cutting $144 billion from direct public spending on infrastructure.
The president has yet to release the full details of his new vision for repairing America\u2019s crumbling roads and bridges. But a report from the New York Times on Saturday suggested that Trump\u2019s new plan for federal infrastructure spending is to reduce it:
On the first day of Infrastructure Week (which is, apparently, a monthly event) , Trump unveiled the first pillar of his new plan: the privatization of America\u2019s air traffic control system.
At present, the Federal Aviation Administration\u2019s system oversees 50,000 flights per day, and is regarded as one of the safest in the world. However, the FAA has been slow to transition from its radar-based system to a more modern, GPS-based one, despite the latter\u2019s potential for enabling quicker routes. The FAA maintains that it has been working diligently to modernize its system, but these efforts have been hobbled by Congress\u2019s failure to supply consistent funding.
On Monday, Trump argued that public-sector red tape and inefficiency were responsible for the FAA\u2019s backwardness. Thus, the president proposed outsourcing air traffic control to a \u201cself-financing, nonprofit organization\u201d that would be funded via user fees, instead of taxes.
The government would still regulate this private company for safety purposes, and over 30,000 FAA employees would retain their jobs, union, and \u201csimilar\u201d benefits after being reassigned to the quasi-private sector.
The proposal enjoys strong support from the major airlines. In reporter David Dayen\u2019s view, that fact is a testament to the measure\u2019s flaws:
Regardless, Democrats are unenthused. There was a time when one could have imagined Trump using his infrastructure ambitions to court bipartisan support \u2014 or else, to drive a wedge between Team Blue\u2019s pragmatists and its stalwart resisters. But now that Trump\u2019s infrastructure plan appears to consist of schemes for privatizing public resources \u2014 and helping Saudi Arabia invest in American toll roads \u2014 there\u2019s little dissension in the Democratic ranks.
\u201cThe entire focus of the President\u2019s infrastructure \u2018proposal\u2019 is on privatization, which sounds like a nice word but when you scratch beneath the surface it means much less construction and far fewer jobs, particularly in rural areas, \u201d Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said on Monday. \u201cIt means Trump tolls from one end of America to the other, and huge profits for financiers who, when they put up the money, want to be repaid by the average driver, worker and citizen.\u201d<\/p>\n

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