Koch Group Warns Trump Infrastructure Plan Could Be ‘Spending Boondoggle’
- Entity influential with Republicans stops short of opposition
- Memo compares public-works initiative with Obama stimulus
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An influential conservative group backed by billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch is questioning a plan to spend $1 trillion on the nation’s infrastructure and warning that one of President Donald Trump’s signature policy initiatives could become a “spending boondoggle.”
In a memo released Friday, Freedom Partners cautions Trump and the Republican-controlled Congress against making the same mistakes that the group says were in the $787 billion federal stimulus bill in 2009. That legislation, passed at former President Barack Obama’s urging, included tax cuts, benefits payments and other spending in addition to infrastructure. It was aimed at boosting the U.S. economy amid the worst recession since the Great Depression.