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Americans for Tax Reform is issuing a Key Vote Alert in opposition to H.R. 2, the Moving Forward Act. 

On Wednesday, the House of Representatives will hold a vote on Speaker Pelosi’s $1.5 trillion green infrastructure bill. Entirely debt-financed, this reckless spending bill proposed by House Democrats is being sold to the public as a coronavirus “stimulus” bill, despite the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) recently reaffirming that government spending on infrastructure programs is a poor form of economic stimulus. In a May report, CBO concluded that after the passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, “seven and a half months after the legislation was enacted, less than 10 percent of the infrastructure funds provided by ARRA had been spent.”

In reality, this legislation is a sweeping expansion of green energy subsidies and handouts to industries politically favored by Democrats. House Democrats have taken the normal bipartisan process of a surface transportation reauthorization bill and turned it into a progressive wishlist of Green New Deal priorities.

As House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman Peter DeFazio himself stated, this proposal is “a radical departure from highway-focused transportation bills” and instead places “climate resilience at the center.”

Below are key non-highway related provisions included in H.R. 2 that lawmakers should be aware of prior to the full House vote:

  • Includes a $25 billion bailout for the Postal Service including a mandate to purchase electric vehicles and requires every postal facility in the country to have electric vehicle charging stations by 2026. 

  • Extends the investment tax credit (ITC) for wind and solar energy through 2025, contradicting the bipartisan agreement reached in December of 2019 to phase these tax credits out permanently.

  • Expands the electric vehicle tax credit by tripling the cap from 200,000 to 600,000 vehicles per manufacturer.

  • Creates a new tax credit for used electric vehicles capped at $2,500.

  • Authorizes $2 billion per year through 2025 to build electric vehicle charging stations. 

  • Allocates $1 billion in credits annually to colleges and universities that establish an environmental justice program. 

  • Includes a $325 million program for electric school buses.

The inclusion of such provisions clearly demonstrates that H.R. 2 is a performative measure meant to appease progressive constituencies and politically-favored industries rather than a serious attempt to fund our nation’s roads and bridges. 

Americans for Tax Reform urges lawmakers to vote “NO” on H.R. 2, which would add roughly $700 billion to the national debt while prioritizing the progressive initiatives of the Green New Deal over the infrastructure needs of the country.