January 8, 2018
President Donald J. Trump
The White House
Washington, DC 20500
Dear Mr. President:
Manufacturers in America are reporting record optimism about the future—and it is a
direct result of the work of your administration and Congress. You have put manufacturing
priorities at the top of the agenda. According to the most recent survey from the National
Association of Manufacturers (NAM)—the voice for the more than 12 million men and women
who make things in America—95 percent of our member manufacturers have a positive outlook
for their businesses, a 20-year record high. Thanks to tax reform, manufacturers are already
making plans to reinvest in their facilities and workers. Ambitious and ongoing regulatory
reforms are freeing manufacturers from overreaching and job-crushing regulations. Now, we ask
you to advance this important work in 2018 by continuing your tremendous leadership for
manufacturers in America with a bipartisan initiative that makes American infrastructure second
to none.
The infrastructure investments of the 1950s and 1960s brought tremendous economic
benefits, built strong communities, improved productivity and competitiveness and allowed
manufacturing to grow and put people to work in solid middle-class jobs. Today, however, as
more and more of our infrastructure crumbles, it is not keeping up with modern demands for
safety and innovation, nor is it giving American workers the tools they need to compete with the
rest of the world. As a result, manufacturers are undercut by increased transportation costs as
well as decreased productivity when water, energy or internet services are disrupted.
Manufacturing, labor, agriculture, finance and government organizations sent the attached letter
to the House and Senate last week to demonstrate strong support for an infrastructure initiative.
But this is not simply an issue for Congress. The nation is again looking to your leadership in its
pursuit of targeted, substantial infrastructure reinvestments that can create jobs, boost
economic growth, save lives and help secure America’s mantle of economic leadership in the
world.
The NAM, as the voice for America’s manufacturers, has ideas on how to get there—and
how to pay for it. Last year, leaders of your administration highlighted the NAM’s infrastructure
blueprint, “Building to Win,” which outlines a way forward. In addition to ending funding
uncertainty and streamlining the permitting process, we identify other key goals:
 Relieve highway bottlenecks, upgrade America’s bridges and tunnels and shore up the
Highway Trust Fund with a reliable, user-based, long-term funding stream.
 Spend the $9 billion balance in the Harbor Maintenance Trust Fund to deepen ports and
harbors.
 Take an expedited approach to upgrading aging locks and dams.
 Eliminate the maintenance backlog of transit and passenger rail systems and continue to
allocate federal funding for the implementation of safety technologies.

Leading Innovation. Creating Opportunity. Pursuing Progress.
733 10th Street, NW • Suite 700 • Washington, DC 20001 •

P

202.637.3043 • F 202.637.3460 • www.nam.org

  Quickly develop a plan to accelerate the implementation of NextGen air traffic
management technology and modernize the passenger facility charge to pay for
upgrading runways and airports.
 Incentivize continued record levels of private capital reinvestment into railroad
infrastructure and enhance intermodal facilities and grade crossings.
 Promote new pipeline investments and continue to update existing energy infrastructure
and advanced technologies, such as microgrids.
 Upgrade and modernize drinking and wastewater infrastructure.
 Remove obstacles to expanded development of broadband infrastructure.
As modern manufacturing evolves and becomes even more productive, manufacturers
rely on complex supply chains and just-in-time principles where parts are ordered, made and
delivered, sometimes within hours. Manufacturers’ ability to compete and grow depends on a
superior infrastructure system that is second to none. Manufacturers believe the nation must
undertake an infrastructure effort that seeks to modernize our aging systems, put to work
private-sector capital to increase efficiencies and deliver results, prioritize and expand public
investment and make a long-term federal commitment to infrastructure not witnessed since the
era of President Dwight Eisenhower.
Your administration, in concert with Congress, has already shown how our country can
take on and achieve big things—especially those that help advance American manufacturing
and the men and women of the manufacturing workforce, such as historic tax reform and
ambitious regulatory reform. Now is the time to revolutionize the infrastructure that makes the
American Dream possible and to build something great for the next generation.
Sincerely,

Jay Timmons
President and CEO
National Association of Manufacturers
Enclosure: IWG Letter, Building to Win

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