U.S. President Joe Biden pushes electric vehicle chargers as energy costs spike
The HinduPresident Joe Biden is highlighting billions of dollars in his giant bipartisan infrastructure deal to pay for the installation of electric vehicle chargers across the country, an investment that he says will go a long way to curbing planet-warming carbon emissions while creating good-paying jobs. He’ll use the occasion to make the case that the $7.5 billion in the new infrastructure law for electric vehicle chargers will help America get “off the sidelines” on green-energy manufacturing. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell took the Senate floor on Tuesday to make the case that “the Biden administration doesn’t have any strategic plan to snap its fingers and turn our massive country into some green utopia overnight.” “They just want to throw boatloads of government money at things such as solar panels and electric vehicles and hope it all works out,” said McConnell, one of 19 GOP senators who voted in favour of the infrastructure bill. He added, “American families are staring down the barrel of skyrocketing heating bills, and the Democrats’ response is to go to war against affordable American energy.” White House press secretary Jen Psaki has stressed that the administration is looking at “every tool in our arsenal” to combat high gasoline prices, saying that Mr. Biden and his economic team are “quite focussed” on the issue.