Buttigieg's star rises as $1T Biden agenda shifts toward him
As President Joe Biden gets set to sign a $1 trillion infrastructure package, many eyes are turning to Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg
November 15, 2021, 12:34 AM
7 min read
Share to FacebookShare to TwitterEmail this articleFILE - Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg speaks at the COP26 U.N. Climate Summit, in Glasgow, Scotland, Nov. 10, 2021. As President Joe Biden gets set to sign a $1 trillion infrastructure package, many eyes are turning to Buttigieg. The law will make the 39-year-old former mayor and former Democratic presidential candidate one of the more powerful brokers in Washington. He'll be handling the largest infusion of cash into the transportation sector since the 1950s creation of the interstate highway system. (AP Photo/Alberto Pezzali, File)
WASHINGTON -- Pete Buttigieg, the transportation secretary who holds the purse strings to much of President Joe Biden’s $1 trillion infrastructure package, was holding forth with reporters on its impact — the promise of more electric cars, intercity train routes, bigger airports — when a pointed question came.
How would he go about building racial equity into infrastructure?
The 39-year-old former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, and 2020 Democratic presidential candidate laid out his argument that highway design can reflect racism, noting that at least $1 billion in the bill will help reconnect cities and neighborhoods that had been racially segregated or divided by road projects.
“I’m still surprised that some people were surprised when I pointed to the fact that if a highway was built for the purpose of dividing a white and a Black neighborhood ... that obviously reflects racism,” he said.
Racial equity is an issue where Democratic priorities and Buttigieg’s future align. One of his greatest shortcomings as a White House candidate was his inability to win over Black voters. How he navigates that heading into the 2022 midterms will probably shape the fortunes of Biden’s agenda and the Democratic Party, if not his own prospects.
Republicans seeking to exploit the issue pounced on Buttigieg's words.
“I heard some stuff, some weird stuff from the secretary of transportation trying to make this about social issues,” said Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. “To me, a road's a road.” Texas Sen. Ted Cruz tweeted sarcastically: “The roads are racist. We must get rid of roads.”
But Buttigieg didn't engage and was off to his next stop, the climate summit in Scotland. There he stood for almost a dozen interviews as he promoted provisions of Biden's bill that would build a network of electric vehicle charging stations. He also engaged with young climate activists and took photos with former President Barack Obama.
On racism in roadways, he said simply: “I don’t know who it hurts to acknowledge that harm was done and to propose doing something to fix it.”
His department later announced it would grant extra discretionary aid to help as many as 20 U.S. communities remove portions of interstates, redesign rural main streets and repurpose former rail lines. That could help places from Syracuse, New York, where many residents back a plan to tear down portions and build a walkable grid, to racially divided areas in New Orleans and St. Paul, Minnesota.
As Biden prepares to sign the infrastructure bill on Monday, eyes are turning to the man still best known as “Mayor Pete,” a newcomer whose promise of “generational change” and real-world sensibility of fixing potholes launched him to the top of the early Democratic primary contests during the 2020 campaign.
Quickly endorsing Biden after abandoning the race, Buttigieg now stands to become one of the more powerful brokers in Washington, handling the largest infusion of cash into the transportation sector since the 1950s creation of the interstate highway system.
“Armed with that much money and significant latitude in how to spend it, Buttigieg is poised to be the most influential secretary of transportation ever," said Jeff Davis, a senior fellow at the Eno Center for Transportation. The department was founded in 1967.
In all, about $120 billion of the $550 billion in new transportation spending in the bill would come in the form of competitive grants that give Buttigieg discretion in how the money is used.
