Bernie Sanders calls Trump’s infrastructure plan ‘a scam’

WASHINGTON – Sen. Bernie Sanders this week denounced President-elect Donald Trump’s infrastructure proposal as “a scam.”

Some Democrats have signaled that updating the nation’s infrastructure might be a something they can work with the incoming president on.

But in a Medium post on Monday, Sanders said that Trump’s plan would create new tax loopholes for corporations. Sanders noted that his Rebuild America Act eliminates loopholes for corporations that stashed profits overseas.

Trump’s plan bears similarity to a piece of legislation proposed in 2015 by Sens. Rand Paul, R-Kentucky, and Barbara Boxer, D-California, which would allow corporations to return foreign earnings to the U.S. at a rate of 6.5 percent to be transferred into the Highway Trust Fund.

“And then he would allow the companies to ‘invest’ in infrastructure projects in exchange for even more tax breaks,” Sanders wrote. “Trump’s plan is corporate welfare coming and going.”

Sanders wrote that he plans to reintroduce his legislation from last year.

“Unlike Trump’s plan, which creates new tax loopholes and is a corporate giveaway, my Rebuild America Act would be paid for by eliminating tax loopholes that allow hugely profitable multinational corporations to stash their profits in offshore tax havens around the world,” he wrote.