Hillary Scholten Grills Transportation Secretary How To Use Bolster Domestic Road Manufacturing

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During a House Transportation Committee hearing before the Congressional recess, Rep. Hillary Scholten (D-MI) asked U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy about bolstering domestic manufacturing in the U.S.

Transcript

00:00Ms. Golden. Thank you. Thanks so much to the chair and the ranking member and to you,

00:05Mr. Secretary, for enduring these hours of questioning and for stepping up to serve

00:11our nation at this critical time. Congress and both the current and previous administrations

00:17have been crystal clear with the FAA. We need to invest in a national aviation system and

00:22modernize our infrastructure. I am pleased to see that Section 624 of the most recent FAA

00:28reauthorization has now been implemented after I pressed FAA officials during a May hearing.

00:35However, the Gerald R. Ford International Airport in my district still does not have a timeline for

00:41when its FAA-owned and operated air traffic control tower will be replaced. This 62-year-old tower is

00:49out of compliance with federal safety and security requirements. The design work for this project is

00:55done and enabling construction will begin this summer with support from the state of Michigan.

01:01But our community needs federal dollars and federal approval because it is an FAA-owned tower. The

01:08previous FAA administrator has assured me that GRR's modernization project was the number two priority

01:14on the FAA's list. Secretary Duffy, can you please provide me with an understanding of the FAA's

01:21prioritization of the tower, an estimated timeline, and we would love to invite you to the district to

01:28see it directly, sir. As I told you before the hearing, Grand Rapids is one of my favorite small

01:33communities in America. It's a great community. I don't have that information for you right now on the

01:39priority list, but I will definitely follow up with you. Again, we talk about the infrastructure

01:45of air traffic control, but you make a really good point. We have really old structures across the

01:51country, and you would probably join a lot of members in this committee talking about your towers

01:54or your TRACONs and how old they are. And that's going to take money and more money to help

02:01everybody out, but we should have an infrastructure plan and resources to build that's consistent with

02:09how great our country is. So I'll work with you on that. We appreciate it so much. I will note that it

02:14is the oldest of the top 75 busiest airports in the country, so certainly a lot of old infrastructure,

02:20but GRR is top of the list. So we really appreciate your attention. Look forward to your follow-up

02:27on that. I want to say one thing that the president and I have in common is a shared goal to bring back

02:33our supply chains and bolster domestic manufacturing. My district is home to a plant for the only domestic

02:40supplier of specific yellow pigments used for road markings. Unfortunately, an estimated 96% of these

02:47pigments used on American roads are sourced from foreign manufacturers, including China, enabling our

02:53taxpayer dollars to leave the U.S. That's why I introduced the bipartisan Paving Our Way for American

02:58Industry Act, which will ensure that these critical pigments would qualify as a constructed material

03:04under the Build America provision. Secretary Duffy, can you speak to how the committee can work with the

03:10department to uplift domestic manufacturers? And I recognize I am a bit over my time, sir, so

03:17you know, if you want to address briefly. Yeah, I would agree with you. I will look at that. I was

03:23not aware, but I want to do all, unless we can't do it in America, and we would all agree we can't,

03:29that's one thing, but when we can do it in America with American businesses and support American

03:33communities, I'm 100% on board. So I'll follow up on that as well. I appreciate it. Really look forward

03:38to working with you. I will submit the remainder of my questions for the record, including looking at

03:45the FAA's aircraft maintenance technician school programs and some of those grants, which I know

03:50a number of people have brought up, but we'd love to follow up with you offline. I'll submit that

03:55question for the record. Thank you. Appreciate the time. We'll yield back.

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