Extreme partisanship, which took hold long before Trump took control of the G.O.P., is part of the answer. It was clear through most of the Obama years that Republicans wanted to prevent good things from happening on a Democratic president’s watch. Under Obama, G.O.P. legislators squeezed federal spending after they took control of the House, supposedly because they were worried about government debt, only to open up the taps once Trump took office.
There was also an element of reflexive opposition to government spending in general, no matter how obvious the need. Mitch McConnell, as Senate majority leader, didn’t do much to oppose Trump — but he did put the brakes on infrastructure spending.
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Among other things, the Port of Baltimore plays a key role in both exports of coal and trade in farm and construction equipment, so the bridge disaster will have direct adverse effects on the heartland as well as the East Coast.
The Minnesota bridge collapse highlighted the decaying state of America’s infrastructure, and one might have expected the disaster to lead to real action, but it didn’t.
President Barack Obama pleaded with Congress to approve broad increases in infrastructure spending and was able to sign a highway funding bill in 2015, but for the most part he was stymied by G.O.P.
Instead, they were floating a roundabout scheme involving tax credits that wouldn’t have generated significant new investment but probably would have offered huge opportunities for cronyism and corruption.
MAGA politicians and media figures wasted no time after the bridge collapse trying to cast blame on the usual suspects, including funds meant to be spent on green energy and, in particular, diversity initiatives: In the immediate wake of the Key Bridge collapse, a Republican state legislator from Utah replied to a post on X disparaging a member of the Maryland Port Commission, writing, “This is what happens when you have Governors who prioritize diversity over the wellbeing and security of citizens”; a Republican former state legislator from Florida posted a video clip of the Key Bridge collapsing with the caption, “DEI did this.” Baltimore’s mayor, Brandon Scott, has been a special target on X, the site formerly known as Twitter, for no apparent reason other than the fact that he’s Black.
As The New Republic’s Greg Sargent points out, some of the MAGA reaction to the bridge collapse is reminiscent of Trump’s behavior during the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic, when he whined about “bailouts” for states that didn’t support him politically.
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