Kentucky Democratic activist Daniel Hurt has a warning for his party:
"Don't let the Republicans who voted against the infrastructure bill take credit for the construction projects when the groundbreaking starts."
The GOP naysayers are Sen. Rand Paul, plus Reps. Andy Barr, James Comer, Brett Guthrie, Thomas Massie and Hal Rogers.
"With all this talk about the bill being bipartisan, it's important that everybody sees who didn't support it--who just played political games with the bill," said Hurt, a member of the Kentucky Democratic Party's State Central Executive Committee who has managed 13 campaigns for the state House and Senate and won 7.
He'd like to see the KDP put up billboards in Barr, Comer, Guthrie, Massie and Rogers's districts, plus statewide billboards citing Paul's vote. All six Republicans are up for reelection this year. "Kenny Colston, who used to work for the KDP, has the same idea," added Hurt, a western Kentuckian from Grand Rivers who is also an honorary delegate to the Paducah-based Western Kentucky AFL-CIO Area Council and the 2017 state AFL-CIO Youth Labor Award recipient.
Kentucky Republicans never miss a chance to burnish their conservative creds and profess their fealty to Donald Trump, who denounced the infrastructure bill. So Paul et al. may stick to their line that the measure is just more Democratic "socialism."
But such a partisan stand might be a tough sell even in Red State Kentucky. The legislation will pump $1.2 trillion into the economy and generate millions of good jobs nationally. Kentucky's nearly $5.6 billion share will produce tens of thousands of good jobs from Jordan to Jenkins. (Check out the AFL-CIO graphic for Kentucky.)
Read the rest at the KY AFL-CIO web site
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