News/Commentary

Buttigieg’s over-reaching funding ultimatum to fix America’s ports has far-reaching implications

February 10, 2023 | | Print Article

The U.S. Department of Transportation’s (USDOT) Maritime Administration (MARAD) announced on Thursday that it will make available more than $662 million in federal funding to fix America’s ports, but only if the projects meet ESG-style standards, including how they address climate change, sustainability, and equity.

This isn’t just a “woke” position from a failed mayor who is never around when a crisis hits. It’s a chilling example of how ESG scores will directly impact average Americans who fail to comply — a notion previously branded a conspiracy theory by liberal sheep.

In a press release, USDOT stated, “The PIDP [Port Infrastructure Development Program] investment will modernize our nation’s ports and help strengthen our supply chains for generations to come, helping to reduce shipping time, costs, and ultimately the costs of goods for the American people.”

“America’s ports play a central role in our supply chains,” said U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg. “With today’s announcement, we are helping make our ports safer, more efficient, and more reliable—strengthening supply chains, reducing costs for the American people, and positioning us for economic success.”

According to USDOT, the discretionary grants will “help eligible applicants including port authorities, states, local governments, indigenous Tribal nations, counties, and other eligible entities complete critical port and port-related infrastructure projects.”

“Grants are awarded on a competitive basis to support projects that improve the safety, efficiency, or reliability of the movement of goods through ports and intermodal connections to ports,” the press release states. “MARAD will also consider how projects address climate change and sustainability, equity, and workforce development objectives.”

Now think about what that really means.

By considering things that have nothing to do with moving goods, USDOT is essentially saying that, unless you have the requisite number of box-checking minorities in positions of authority — unless the project is ensuring it won’t leave too big of a carbon footprint — the port, the people it employs, the people the construction and engineering companies tasked with fixing them employ, and every single American who didn’t get their Amazon delivery on time will be overlooked in favor of a project that dutifully adheres to the Biden administration’s progressive green agenda.

MARAD’s ESG caveat expresses the “same broad goals that the Biden administration has been supporting as it tries to impose environment, social and governance (ESG) goals on private investors,” Fox News reports.

In January, MARAD announced that more than $20,800,000 is currently available for Small Shipyard Grants “to: (1) make capital and related improvements to qualified shipyard facilities that will be effective in fostering efficiency; competitive operations; and quality ship construction, repair, and reconfiguration; and (2) provide training for workers in shipbuilding, ship repair, and associated industries.”

That money, too, comes with an agenda-affirming catch.

“The Department also seeks to award projects that address equity and environmental justice, particularly for communities that have experienced decades of underinvestment and are most impacted by climate change, pollution, and environmental hazards, consistent with Executive Order 14008, Tackling the Climate Crisis at Home and Abroad (86 FR 7619),” the press release states.

MARAD stated it intends to use the grant program, in part, to support “the free and fair choice to join a union.”

Applicants are “encouraged” — but not “required” –to explain “how their project will include an equity assessment, which evaluates whether a project will create proportional impacts and remove transportation-related disparities to all populations in a project area, consistent with Executive Order 13985, Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government (86 FR 7009).”

“MARAD will consider the extent to which projects advance equity and Justice40 to promote fairness and opportunity and may prioritize those projects that advance this selection consideration,” the Department writes.

Justice40 is a Biden initiative that “has made it a goal that 40 percent of the overall benefits of certain Federal investments flow to disadvantaged communities that are marginalized, underserved, and overburdened by pollution.”

In case you were wondering, “equity”, according to MARAD, “is defined as the consistent and systematic fair, just, and impartial treatment of all individuals, including individuals who belong to underserved communities that have been denied such treatment, such as Black, Latino, and Indigenous and Native American persons, Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders and other persons of color; members of religious minorities; lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ+) persons; persons with disabilities; persons who live in rural areas; and persons otherwise adversely affected by persistent poverty or inequality.”

Because, as we all know, when it comes to getting shipping containers loaded and unloaded efficiently, “equity” is a priority that just can not be ignored.

DONATE TO BIZPAC REVIEW

Please help us! If you are fed up with letting radical big tech execs, phony fact-checkers, tyrannical liberals and a lying mainstream media have unprecedented power over your news please consider making a donation to BPR to help us fight them. Now is the time. Truth has never been more critical!

$10
$15
$25
$50
Other
$
Success! Thank you for donating. Please share BPR content to help combat the lies.
Melissa Fine
Latest posts by Melissa Fine (see all)

Comment

We have no tolerance for comments containing violence, racism, profanity, vulgarity, doxing, or discourteous behavior. If a comment is spam, instead of replying to it please click the ∨ icon below and to the right of that comment. Thank you for partnering with us to maintain fruitful conversation.

BPR INSIDER COMMENTS

Scroll down for non-member comments or join our insider conversations by becoming a member. We'd love to have you!

Latest Articles