MSNBC's Reid: Biden's Infrastructure Package Was 'White Guy Employment Act'

MSNBC host Joy Reid said Thursday on her show “The ReidOut” that President Joe Biden’s Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act is a “white guy employment act.”

While interviewing transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg, Reid asked, “Do you think it was a mistake, looking back? Because the infrastructure bill that was passed was cleaved apart from what’s now being called Build Back Better. And in a sense, it’s a bill that’s like a white guy employment act. Right? There is going to be a lot of working-class men that are going to get employed by that bill. But that’s the very cohort that is much more likely to reward Republicans for that. That’s who they vote for.”

“Most working-class white guys vote Republican,” she continued. “Meanwhile, all the stuff for the women, for moms, for people who need childcare, for people of color, that’s going to affect climate, which young people really care about, you know, extending the child tax credit, all the stuff that helps families and women and younger people and people with college debt, all that got dropped. Do you think it was a mistake to split those bills?”

Buttigieg said, “No, and I want to challenge the idea that this is a bill that only benefits one part of the population. I get where you’re coming from and what you’re saying, but look. You look at something like the investment in transit, you know, it’s Americans of color, commuters of color who are most likely to depend on that. You look at the jobs we’re going to create, and yeah, they have been traditionally white and male, but it doesn’t have to stay that way.”

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