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It’s as if Republican lawmakers can’t help themselves when it comes to anything requiring bipartisanship — even in the face of disaster. How else to explain their churlish response to the tragic collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore?
The incident itself was shocking enough — a towering cargo ship nearly 1,000 feet long and weighing more than 100,000 tons with freight lost power in the middle of the night and crashed into a critical support pylon. Within seconds, the 1.6 mile span fell into the water and six construction workers who were making overnight repairs on the bridge died.
Later that day, President Joe Biden assured the state and public that the federal government would cover the cost of rebuilding the vital transportation link, the loss of which has crippled the Port of Baltimore and could have serious repercussions for the nation’s economy. Incredibly, the president’s pledge triggered some House Republicans, who wasted little time posting their objections on social media. Pennsylvania Rep. Dan Meuser labeled the promise “outrageous.” Rep. Jeff Duncan of South Carolina figured this might be a good time to make federal aid conditional, saying the money should come from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act Biden signed in 2021, adding “before we spend one more dime for domestic infrastructure, we must build” — wait for it — “a … border wall.”
This unfortunately has become the new normal in this Congress. But it wasn’t always this way and it doesn’t have to be.
The most comparable situation to the Key bridge came on Aug. 1, 2007, in Minneapolis. It was a scorching hot summer evening when the eight-lane I-35W bridge over the Mississippi River—loaded with rush hour traffic — collapsed without warning. Thirteen people were killed and 145 were injured. More than 100 vehicles fell with the bridge and about half of those plummeted into the river below.
The response to that catastrophe is worth examining.