Klobuchar unveils $1 trillion road, rail and port plan

The plan, which includes more than $650 billion in federal funding, would be the Democratic presidential hopeful’s “top budget priority” should she be elected in 2020.

   Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., laid out on Thursday a $1 trillion infrastructure plan that would repair and replace roads, highways and bridges; overhaul rail infrastructure; update ports, locks and dams; and invest in inland waterways, among other objectives.
   Announced in a Medium post, the plan would be the presidential hopeful’s “top budget priority” and  she would “work to get it done during the first year of her presidency” should she be elected in 2020.
   “A world-class transportation system will increase our safety and lower costs for commuters and businesses that depend on getting goods to market,” the post reads.
   Klobuchar’s plan included more than $650 billion in federal funding through public-private partnerships, bond programs and expanded clean energy tax incentives. It called for raising the corporate tax rate from 21 percent to 25 percent to pay for the infrastructure investment, which would generate $400 billion of the federal spending, according to AP News.
   The corporate tax rate was cut from 35 percent in President Trump’s 2017 tax bill.
   Klobuchar (pictured above) also called for “closing loopholes that encourage U.S. companies to move jobs and operations overseas, establishing a financial risk fee on our largest banks and increasing efforts for tax enforcement,” according to the port.
   The senator’s plan also would reintroduce the Obama administration’s Build America Bonds, “which provided states and local governments a direct 35 percent subsidy in lieu of the traditional tax-exempt bond and generated more than $180 billion to finance public infrastructure projects,” the post reads.
   The seven-point proposal also called for protection against flooding, the expansion of public transit options, rebuilding schools and overhauling the housing policy, connecting every household to the internet by 2022 and building climate smart and green infrastructure.