WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden unveiled plans for allocating nearly $42.5 billion to build out high-speed internet networks, touting it as a way his administration aimed to help all Americans — even those who did not vote for him — ahead of his 2024 reelection bid.
“I promised to be a president for all Americans, whether or not they voted for me or whether or not they voted for these laws,” Biden said at the White House on Monday, kicking off a week of events promoting “Bidenomics.” “These investments will help all Americans. We’re not going to leave anyone behind.”
The president and his aides are looking to refocus attention on Biden’s legislative accomplishments, in particular his economic agenda, with polls showing lagging voter enthusiasm for Biden’s reelection campaign.
Biden highlighted the impact high-speed internet would have for rural communities — areas of the country where Democrats have struggled to win voters.
“Connecting everyone in America to affordable, reliable high-speed internet is a bold goal for a great nation, especially one as vast and geographically diverse as ours,” said Biden. “We are all well on our way. We are just going to have to keep it going.”
Pushing ‘Bidenomics’
The broadband event in the White House’s East Room is the first in a nationwide tour of top administration officials highlighting projects, grants and public-private partnerships funded through legislation passed during Biden’s presidency. On Wednesday, the president will give a speech in Chicago on the impact of his policies on the U.S. economy.
“In the weeks and months ahead, the president, members of his cabinet, and senior Administration officials will continue fanning out across the country to take the case for Bidenomics and the President’s Investing in America agenda directly to the American people,” senior Biden advisers Anita Dunn and Mike Donilon said in a memo released by the White House.
Each state, along with the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, is guaranteed at least $100 million under the initiative. The remaining funding will be allocated based on new maps drafted by the Federal Communications Commission that found some 7% of the nation was unserved by high-speed internet.
But Monday’s event in some ways reinforced the challenges the president and his staff face.
Biden announced awards to U.S. states and territories under the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment Program, created by his infrastructure law to fund planning and deployment of internet to communities lacking high-speed access.
But states will still have an opportunity to challenge the federal awards over the next six months. The first tranche of funding – slightly less than $8.5 billion – won’t be doled out until December. The remaining $34 billion won’t be distributed until spring 2025 — after the presidential election.
Furthermore, there’s concern that “Buy American” requirements in the legislation could hobble or delay the efforts, because there aren’t enough of the electronic components like routers needed for advanced fiber networks produced domestically.
Internet service providers who are vying for the program’s subsidies have asked the federal government to relax those requirements, but doing so would violate Biden’s pledge to spur a domestic manufacturing renaissance.
Low polling
Those complications could help explain why a Washington Post-ABC News survey earlier this year found that 62% of Americans believed Biden has accomplished “not very much” or “little or nothing” during his presidency, while just 36% say he has accomplished “a great deal” or “a good amount.”
The White House is hopeful that the latest push will help remind voters of the president’s economic accomplishments.
While voters regularly express concerns about Biden’s age, his senior advisers noted that his signature legislative accomplishments share broad bipartisan approval. His speech in Chicago is intended to stress that the post-pandemic recovery has particularly benefited the manufacturing sector, as well as poor and middle class Americans.
“The core pillars of the President’s economic plan are not only delivering results and growing our economy from the bottom up and middle out — they are also strongly supported by the American people,” Dunn and Donilon wrote in the memo.
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(With assistance from Ryan Teague Beckwith.)
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