🎙️ Voice is AI-generated. Inconsistencies may occur.
Senator Rob Portman (R-Ohio) called President Joe Biden's infrastructure bill "the right thing for the country" after a bipartisan committee negotiated the terms of the deal.
Portman appeared on ABC News' This Week on Sunday to discuss the infrastructure negotiations. Show host Jonathan Karl asked Portman if the president was negotiating the bill in good faith and brought up the miscommunication between Biden and a group of Republican senators.
"I think that there's been good faith on both sides," Portman responded. "It's true that there was a miscommunication there in terms of linking the two, but that was never part of our discussion and never part of the bipartisan group discussion that's been going on for almost four months now. And, certainly not when the president and his team engaged to negotiate the final aspects of this, so the bottom line is it's a popular bill for all the right reasons."
The president clarified on Sunday that he was not threatening to veto the infrastructure package if senators passed a reconciliation bill. Portman initially said he was "blindsided" after Biden praised the bipartisan negotiators on Twitter and then appeared to threaten to veto the deal hours later at a press conference, The Hill reported.
"I'm glad they've now been de-linked and it's very clear that we can move forward with a bipartisan bill that's broadly popular," Portman told Karl.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell criticized Biden's comment on the Senate floor.
"That's not the way to show you're serious about getting a bipartisan outcome," McConnell said on Thursday.
When the president walked back the statement saying he did not mean to imply that he would veto the deal, GOP senators jumped back on the deal. On Sunday, Senator Mitt Romney (R-Utah) talked to Jake Tapper on CNN's State of the Union and told the host that he trusts the president to sign a bipartisan package.
Senator Bill Cassidy (R-La.) joined Chuck Todd on NBC News' Meet the Press also on Sunday to address the miscommunication as well. He shared his thoughts on how McConnell reacted:
"Now, he didn't like the president, throwing the wrench in there, saying, 'Listen, the two are tied together,'" Cassidy said. "But I think Mitch McConnell wants infrastructure as much as anyone else. He wants the jobs that this will create. I think Leader McConnell will be for it, if it continues to come together as it is."
Portman said that the package was "the right thing for the country" and noted that the deal would create many jobs and help the U.S. be more competitive on the global stage.
The deal would also fulfill a long-time need in infrastructure that past presidents have wanted for years, according to Portman.
"Remember when Donald Trump talked about the need for a $2 trillion infrastructure bill? But so did President Obama before him, and so did Bush before him, so we are finally getting something done here that's been talked about in Washington for decades," Portman said.
Newsweek reached out to Portman for comment, but did not hear back by publication time.
