Jennifer Rene Psaki

“ We’re certainly open, always, to hearing from — hearing ideas and proposals from Democrats and Republicans. We certainly put in the caregiving component of the package — the President did — because he believes that there is a huge impact on our workforce of the — caregiving has a huge impact on our workforce — the cost, the time, the energy, the effort — and it is something that is keeping people from — out of the workforce, keep — preventing them from progressing in their jobs. ”

“ I will say that there is, in the American Jobs Plan — and there is a lot in there, so this was a piece that didn’t receive as much focus — a proposal of 5 million — a $5 billion investment over eight years to support evidence-based community violence intervention. And, you know, this is a step that, of course, would be — would help on gun violence and community violence.
We also know that violence is a public health crisis disproportionately impacting Black and brown communities and Americans. ”

“ I think the President believes that Democrats, that independents, that Republicans — as we’ve seen in polls across the country — believe that we should do more to invest in our infrastructure.And infrastructure means ensuring there’s access to broadband. Infrastructure means ensuring that we rebuild our roads, our railways, and bridges. ”

“ We can continue to do more to meet people where they are. That’s where our focus is.I’d also note that, though some governors have rolled back public health guidelines — something obviously we wouldn’t support given the public health guidelines are in place — a number of mayors, local elected officials, businesses have kept them in place even in a number of those states, because it’s not a political issue, and they are — have taken those steps in order to keep the people in their jurisdictions safe. ”

“ Are there red lines in the first phase of the infrastructure bill on things like the — on the money that’s earmarked for racial inequality — excuse me, racial equity — the pot of money for the $400 billion for seniors? ”

“ Well, what we’re talking about here — that’s exactly why we shouldn’t be increasing taxes on the American people, on people making less than $400,000 a year; why we shouldn’t be putting in place user fees — because people are still trying to get through this period of time.Corporations who have had their tax rate lowered to 21 percent — lower by a great margin than it’s been ever in history ”

“ If you don’t want to raise the corporate tax rate — still lower than it’s been over the last 70 years and umph, you know, across decades — if you don’t want to do that, if you don’t want to put in place a global minimum tax, what are the alternatives? ”

“ The President’s focus is on the objectives he’s trying to achieve, which is rebuilding our infrastructure so we can compete around the world; putting millions of Americans back to work; easing the burden, as you’ve noted, on — of caregiving, which is impacting millions of Americans who are not in the workforce in the way they would like.So I’m not going to give you red lines from here ”

“ Q And former President Donald Trump says that the tax increases that are in — the corporate tax increases that are in the plan will shift more companies and jobs overseas and that China will be the big winner there. It also depends on getting countries to stop a race to the bottom on corporate taxes. ”

“ We’ll see what others come forward with in terms of different proposals or different ways to rebuild our infrastructure and ensure we’re competing with China and better positioning ourselves in the world. Q And just one last question on the impact of this: The President said, yesterday, that along with the stimulus bill, an estimated 18 million jobs could be created with this plan. We’ve seen a recent S&P forecast estimate that more than 2 million jobs would be created. What’s the range that the White House thinks in terms of how many millions of jobs will actually be created by this plan? ”

“ And it is something that either would have to be paid for or not.But, you know, our focus right now is on ensuring that we are getting relief to the broad swath of the American people who are most impacted by the downturn: the 10 million Americans out of work, people who are looking to be a part of growing industries of the future. But we understand that many Democrats — or some Democrats, I should say, are focused on that and interested in discussing it. ”

“ We’re very open to members of Congress coming back with different ideas about how we can achieve the objectives outlined. It’s an opportunity to lay out, in a speech, what our objective is, which is to compete with China; invest in infrastructure ”

“ We expect there’ll be a number of outside economists who will — and economic forecasters — who will do projections in the coming days. We’ll see what those look like. We expect them to be right in the ballpark of what the President said yesterday. ”

“ They will be in charge of communicating with the public, communicating with Congress, communicating with mayors and governors, having discussions about different components of the bill — whether it’s broadband or different infrastructure components — the impact on businesses.These are the Cabinet members who will all play a role in this engagement. ”

“ Today, the Biden-Harris administration is launching a nationwide grassroots network of local voices and trusted community leaders to encourage people to get vaccinated. We’ve talked in here quite a bit about how effective and impactful we’ve seen having community voices, trusted voices be the voi- — the people who are getting the information out to communities. ”

“ Q And given that the COVID economy has been hard on so many businesses, is this the time to try to increase taxes when they are not really out of the COVID slide of the economic impact of the pandemic? ”

“ It accounts for — I think the number is about 1 percent of our GDP, so it certainly is a significant attempt to address that. It’s also a two-part proposal.And the President will be speaking more in the coming weeks about how we can do more to help our caregivers, to help our — well, some of that was in this package — but help address the needs of childcare, help lower the cost of healthcare, and help do more to ensure we’re easing the burden on families across the country.
Q Is the President confident that he can get Democrats united behind his plan? ”

“ It also makes it so that outside groups can’t provide water or food to people in line. Right? Q Yeah, but the — MS. PSAKI: It makes it more difficult to absentee vote. Are those things all correct? Q The voting on the day of is seven to seven, and early voting — it can standardize adding Saturday and Sunday. So my question is: Is the tone going to change out of the White House? Or — MS. PSAKI: The tone for a bill that limits voting access and makes it more difficult for people to engage in voting in Georgia? ”