Pelosi’s office says two major projects will be removed from the Covid bill

Pelosi’s office says two major projects will be removed from the Covid bill

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The original bill, passed by the House, included $ 1.425 billion in funding to help with transit rail capital projects, including the expansion of the Bay Area Rapid Transit line from San Jose to Santa Clara, California. It was part of $ 30 billion in public transportation support in the emergency relief package, but Pelosi’s office said Tuesday that the Senate MP had spoken out against it because it was part of a pilot project.

The relief package will also no longer include funding for the Seaway International Bridge in New York State. The $ 1.5 million funding was proposed during the Trump administration and supported by Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik, whose bridge includes the bridge.

A Senate source told CNN that the request for funding for the bridge to include in the emergency lending legislation was originally directed by the Department of Transportation under the Trump administration in the spring of 2020 and that Senate leader Chuck Schumer , a Democrat in New York, did not know. the funding was in the bill until he read it in media reports.

Republicans have cited both projects as examples of spending in the bill that would benefit Democratic leaders’ districts and home states, and have very little to do with helping Americans recover from the Covid-19 pandemic. Stefanik does not support the bill on relief and says funding for the bridge should not have been included.

The BART extension is not in Pelosi’s California district and would have taken place 50 miles south of the area she represents.

Pelosi spokesman Drew Hammill said on Tuesday that Covid had “an immediate and overwhelming effect on all of our transportation systems and the millions of transportation and construction work involved,” but now with the removal of the two projects, he added, ‘it is unclear how Republicans will justify their opposition to the law.

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