Jul. 29—The infrastructure bill negotiated by a bipartisan group of 22 senators including Sens. Jeanne Shaheen and Maggie Hassan will move forward after the Senate voted to proceed Wednesday evening.

The Senate voted to consider an infrastructure bill including $550 billion of new spending over five years for roads, bridges, the electric grid, airports and public transit as well as and low-emission vehicles and broadband. The bill will be considered on the Senate floor and senators may offer amendments before a final vote.

"We still have a ways to go but we are going to get this thing across the finish line," Shaheen said.

During a Wednesday evening news conference, Shaheen was singled out by Sens. Krysten Sinema (D-Ariz.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) for her work on the broadband provisions of the bill.

"One of the lessons of the pandemic is we must expand broadband throughout this country," Collins said.

The bipartisan framework announced Wednesday focused on physical infrastructure. This is in contrast to the $3.5 trillion bill proposed by other Senate Democrats, which includes funds for child care, and would expand Medicare to cover retirees' vision, hearing and dental health.

"It happened from the center out," Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) said of the bipartisan framework. "At a time when Washington seems broken, this group of members behind me came together."

Portman said it was clear roads and bridges needed work, and that internet needs upgrades. Every modern president has proposed a broad infrastructure bill, including a $1.5 trillion proposal from former President Donald Trump.

Unlike an earlier proposal, the current iteration of the infrastructure deal does not include a gas tax increase. The senators will use unspent funds from the three COVID-19 stimulus bills, and hope stepped-up tax enforcement of cryptocurrency will generate revenue, as well as what the White House termed "targeted corporate user fees."

But the bipartisan group is counting largely on growth stimulated by the infrastructure spending to help pay for it, and on savings created by the infrastructure upgrades.

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