Jennifer Rene Psaki

“ Also, the whole point of the tax reform as proposed by the administration is to get rid of the loopholes, level the playing field between big businesses and small businesses. I don’t know any small businesses in Rhode Island who are shielding their profits in tax havens around the world. Like, it’ll level the playing field, raise more money, and allow us to invest in job creating, infrastructure, and job training.
So, as a former business owner and as a former governor who recruited businesses, I think it’s a winner for business. ”

“ And I think there is a recognition that President Biden is doing the right thing in pushing us to conceive of infrastructure as broad, as including investments in STEM, research and development, investments in basic research, investments in broadband, investments in training our workforce. And the truth of it is, that’s what it’s going to take to compete.
A key component of the American Jobs Plan is training our workforce. This is a reality. The changes in the American economy, many of which have been massively accelerated by COVID, are very scary for millions of Americans. ”

“ We need to ensure that investments in infrastructure, advanced manufacturing, workforce development, and our care economy are made — are made at the scale we need and are made in every single community in America.
And as the President has — has led us to — is leading us to build back better, that means we need to do so more inclusively and ensure that these investments that we are making — in broadband, in housing, in the care economy, in water — are in every community in America: rural, tribal, urban, communities of color, and reaching everyone across America. ”

“ If you have the guts, in the middle of your career, to go out and get some job training to retrain yourself to get a new job, then we need to be there for you to provide high-quality, demand-driven, affordable — if not free — job training.
The American Jobs Plan also is about strengthening our supply chains, making things in America, making critical goods in America, creating good jobs in the process, and increasing the security that we have, knowing that we aren’t overly dependent on other countries for critical supplies. ”

“ And also, we have millions and millions of women, mostly women of color, working full-time, caring for our loved ones, living in poverty. It’s time to make those investment so they can have a dignified job and so that we can shore up our communities.
As Jen said, I did a lot of work of this as governor. And it’s something that I’m very proud of President Biden and to be on the team of a president who’s investing in the care economy.
So, fundamentally, this plan invests in American workers and businesses, small and large alike, so they can compete and win in the global marketplace. ”

“ And the fact of the matter is, we know that lack of investment, particularly in public transportation, transit, water, housing, has hurt low-income folks and people of color the most. And it’s time to finally rectify that systemic inequality and build back better and more equally. ”

“ It matters because it makes it harder for small businesses to compete. It makes — it matters because it makes it harder for American companies to compete, and it makes it harder for the average American to get a decent job and to get the skills they need in order to get a high-paying job in the industries that are growing today and tomorrow. ”

“ We’re going to have enough vaccine to vaccinate — more than enough, I should say — every adult American by the end of May.He has increased and invested in the number of people we have as vaccinators, increased the number of vaccination sites around the country, more than doubling the number of pharmacies, investing in mass vaccination sites, investing in community health centers.
It is now incumbent upon the American people to do their job and continue to mask up, get the vaccine when they’re eligible. ”

“ But as the Secretary just conveyed, our workers, our workforce is part of the backbone and the infrastructure of America’s economy and communities.And if you have home health workers, as you noted, who are predominantly women of color; they are predominantly workers who are paid often $11 an hour, about, on average — these are communities and individuals who need greater assistance and need greater help. ”

“ One, you cannot get better than American workers, American ingenuity, American innovation. Two, this Jobs Plan will enhance American competitiveness. You know, I know from being governor, businesses want to locate in communities with good infrastructure, good public transportation, clean water, excellent public schools. That’s where businesses want to be. That’s where their employees want to work.So, if we pass this package, it will massively — businesses will want to be here — will want to be here more than they do now. ”

“ So, a few — a few points.First of all, every business leader I talk to, big and small, agrees we must make these investments in infrastructure in order to compete. If we don’t invest in semiconductors, we’re going to fall further behind. If we don’t invest in job training, we’re not going to have the workforce that businesses need to compete. ”

“ Democrats and Republicans will have ideas about what they like or don’t like about the plan. That’s a good thing. That’s democracy in action. That’s the American way.Our view — his view is we don’t just fix what is broken today, we build for tomorrow. And his idea of infrastructure is evolving — is that it should evolve to address the needs of the American people. We believe there is a fair amount of opportunity for agreement — that we are open to compromise, we welcome the debate, and we’ll look forward to having those conversations when members return. ”

“ But our focus is not — we don’t believe the wall is an answer. We have never believed the wall as an answer to addressing the challenges — immigration challenges at the border. That’s why we’re proposing an investment in smart –investments in smart security at the border, why we’re driving 20 — what we see as 21st century solutions for border management, and why we believe we should build a functioning immigration system.
There’s a review underway of, kind of, where this funding had been allocated and not, but it’s currently paused and — for the most part. ”

“ And what we’ve actually seen through our data and research is that it’s not always famous people — and often not famous people — like the President or athletes or former elected officials who are going to reach any group who are hesitant or have concerns about the vaccine — hesitancy or safety.So this is the reason why a big part of our funding and our approach to our public campaign is actually for local groups and organizations. ”

“ I can’t put a timeline on it, Zeke. We do feel, of course, that diplomacy is the right way to approach this — this — these challenge — this challenge; that doing that in coordination and close cooperation with our partners is also exactly the right approach. ”

“ You might say to yourself, “Why is the Commerce Secretary talking about investments in the care economy?” Because it matters. It is core to our competitiveness. In order for you to be able to go to work, you need to know that your loved one is being taken care of. ”

“ We also need to invest in domestic manufacturing, particularly for critical industries like semiconductors. We all know semiconductors are the building blocks of our future economy. And as we go through the data and digital revolution, semiconductors underpin so much of the new technology where we’ll see job creation. ”

“ And all of the investments the survey looked at — from roads and bridges, to housing, clean energy, and manufacturing — have the support of over 60 percent of voters and a majority of independents.
The evidence is unanimous that the American people support the President’s vision of rebuilding our economy and his plan to pay for it by asking big corporations to pay their fair share.
A Morning Consult poll, just last week, showed that 2-to-1 registered voters back a hypothetical $3 trillion infrastructure package. ”

“ There are not a broad swath of options for manufacturing facilities across the country.So HHS and others can give you more specifics of what the options are that are available, but our focus is on getting vaccines produced, distributed, in the arms of the American people, and to relying on the process that is in place by the United States government.
We have one of the most stringent set of review processes in the world. So, in our view, this is the process working. We remain on track to have the number of doses — enough doses to vaccinate the entire — all adult Americans by the end of May. ”

“ A new survey, just yesterday, from Invest in America and Data for Progress found that 73 percent of voters backed the American Jobs Plan. That includes the support of 57 percent of Republican voters. Dig into — digging into the numbers shows just how broad the support is: 68 percent of independents, 64 percent of Republicans back the President’s proposed investment in the care economy — something the Secretary just talked about quite a bit. ”

“ As you know, equity is central to what we do — COVID and addressing the pandemic. And ensuring we are taking steps to address getting the vaccine out to communities around the country is central to our focus.We are constantly monitoring where the vaccine doses are going and that they’re equitably distributed. ”

“ We need to play offense and defense. The jobs package is offense: invest in America competitiveness so we can play offense. A lot of the tools that Commerce has are defense: the entities list, tariffs, et cetera.So we are — you know, led by Jake Sullivan and our team interagency review — we’re in the process of doing it now. ”

“ That’s why we’ve increased our investment in community health centers massively over the course of the last several weeks; why we’ve increased our investment in mobile clinics. Because one of the issues we’re seeing is access. ”

“ In addition, the people who are impacted most by the need for caregiving are women. We see that statistically: About 2 million women have left the workforce as a result of the pandemic.
And so, our objective and our focus is on addressing physical infrastructure, the infrastructure that is going to help us compete, including broadband. ”

“ As we’ve seen in the rece- — even in recent weeks, things happen and we have to plan for contingencies as well.But when we are confident about our supply, about our ability to provide for the American public, the President is absolutely committed to playing a constructive role in being a part of the global community’s efforts to get the pandemic under control. ”

“ To be a governor in America today is a challenge, and everyone is, you know, trying hard. I would say, first of all, they are so lucky that President Biden is in office now, after what we went through last year.Secondly, follow the President’s lead around vaccinations. The administration is doing a fantastic job getting vaccinations out the door. ”

“ However, we are working, of course, on — as we would be on any issue, in coordination with our partners and allies about a range of concerns we have with China’s behavior and their actions, including the genocide of Uighur Muslims in China, including actions that China has taken as it relates to economic and security steps.And so that is something we would do in partnership and coordination with our partners in the region. Just like any relationship, there are areas where we feel we can work together; areas where we have great concerns. ”

“ Well, I think that we know that addressing the root causes means working with these countries to help create a collaborative and a cooperative approach to addressing what the circumstances are on the ground, whether that is economic challenges, a response to challenges related to hurricanes that have impacted a lot of these communities.And what we’re trying to do is work with them to determine how we can get to these root causes to reduce — to disincentivize travel from the region. ”

“ And I’m going to — I can promise you as Commerce Secretary — like, right now, we have $3 billion from the rescue package to invest in communities — I promise you now, equity is front and center. And that’s why I was saying we have to get the money everywhere — rural, tribal, urban — and prioritizing those who have been left behind.With respect to the job training — you know, I can fall on my own experience — we did a back-to-work Rhode Island job training initiative, and we said we’re going to tar- — we’re going to make sure it’s equitable. More than half of the people trained were women ”

“ The mission of Joining Forces is to support those who also serve. The work and priorities of Joining Forces will center on the needs of military families in the areas of employment and entrepreneurship, military child education, and health and wellbeing. ”

“ We monitor the uptick in outbreak and COVID rates in communities and see how it’s being — how it’s impacting different communities. We work directly with governors to help address where there are upticks in communities and where we see there are communities that are not getting ready access to the vaccine. ”