>> we're going to leave this program and take you live to president biden talking about community and revitalization. the president: good to see you all. [indiscernible] hello, milwaukee. thankr family story with so many of us. your grandfather served our nation in uniform and started a family business only to see itoy disconnected because of a new highway. and he never gave up, neither

have you nor have the people of this i want to thank you. governor, my good friend, thank you, governor, you're the best. i want to thank for you youroaro getting us through covid and rebuilding the economy and so much more. the same goes for great senator tammy and your incredible congressman gwen moore. her son here? all right. well, she reprents her hometown with such incredible integrity and tenacity. mayor johnson, one of the most impressive young mayors i've met and i met all of them, i think. i really mean it. i don't know where you're sitting. there y are. stand up, mr. mayor. i tell everybody don't run for

mayor and live and think they can solve all your problems. thank you for your support of the city and this project that i'm here t talk about. look, communities everywhere at this boys and girls club -- i've been a gigantic supporter, the biggest in the when i was a senator i provided a lot of money when the crime sprees were going on for the boys and girls clubs. what you do is build confidee, and a sense of belonging and really matters. this project is for you, a future you really deserve. look, the story of brownsville here in milwaukee is one we see all across the country. our interstate highway system laid out in the 1950's was a ground breaking connection of our country from coast to coast was the purpose testify and transform the way people live, work, and travel. instead of communities, it divided them. these highways actually tore them apart. i come from a city, wilmington,

delaware, where the same thing happened, we're in a situation where i-95 is four lanes going through a community that was all african-american and just split it and it's now about maybe 70 yards wide and i yet, why did yt first? i don't know. all kidding aside the same thing happened here and other citys across the country. there are cities all across the country where the highways used to be along red lining -- along with red lining, they disconnected entire communities from opportunities. sometimes in an effort to reinforce segregation. that's what happened in milwaukee. more than a hundred years ago, brownsville was the home of a thriving hub of black culture and commerce, home fes. black small businessmen, from hotels and jazz clubs to restaurants like ray's grandfather.

in the middle of the thousands f black americans migrated from the south to milwaukee and other cities in the north to get good paying manufacturing jobs. by the 1960's, the so-called urban renewal swept this country and the construction of i-94 and homes and 1,000 businesses. ripping through neighborhoods and nearby roads. here osi widened displacing ress and businesses so you could get downtown. today sixth street is a wide road without a protective bike path, ride lanes and bus lanes with lit space. speeding and reckless driving crashes five times as the city's average. all this locking people out of opportunities and leaving them more isolated from the social and economic life of the rest of the city. congresswoman moore told me when

she wasived a short walk from the public library, a safe place to read and learn where libraries who were given -- the librarian gave cake to children when they showed up to read. that's true, isn't it? plan disrupted the walk and made the library inaccessible. sadly too many communities across america face thes of wealth, prosperity and the possibilities that still reverberate today. imagine all those homes, mom and pop stores that could have been passed down from family to family, financial security, generational wealth would have resulted. imagine what they contributed to then and what they could have contributed all these years and what that would have meant for all of milwaukee and the communities across thentry. for generations black, brown, and native american, asian americans, native hawaiians, communities weren't fully included in our democracy or

economy but yet by pure courage, heart, and grit they never gave up and pursued the full promise of today, we're recognizing that history to make new history. i'm here to announce the first of its kind iest, $3.3 billion and 132 projects in 42 cities will help right a historic wrong. [applause] president: in the prs delivering environmental justice by reconnects neighborhoods and new opportunities forure prosperity and many possibilities. these investments advance my justice initiative to deliver at as of all the benefits of clean transit, clean energy and climate investment to disadvantaged communities. that's a commitment i madend

here in milwaukee will be $36 million in new federal funding to rebuild sixth street. [applause] the president: and a sidewalk for children walking to school, safer bike lanes for residents and visitor, dedicated bus lanes to get to work faster, new trees to provide shade and modern from flowing into the milwaukee river and lake michigan. these of life changing improvements and will make it easier for historic black communities in the north and latino communities in the south to access school, opportunities and entertainment walking the by to getting to the community college. my wife is a full time teacher to a community college. y'all think i'm kidding. i'm not. ensure good

construction jobs go to members of the community, benefiting the very same projects. with the help of your congressional delegation, especially senator tammy baldwin who worked so hard for these funds are making sure the construction materials for this project are made in america. and if i can digress for one second, look, you know, i've been very involved for a while. i know i look like i just arrived but all kidding aside, i didn't realize, though i was deeply involved initially in the civil righolved to run for the t place, i didn't realized banking in roosevelt's term when they were going for the fights to the unions to organize they had a provisional law not many presidents paid attention to that said the congress

appropriates money and the president can spend on any project and he must use an american worker and he must use american m very few, very few le by that. very few presidents did that but not anymore. that's why we're creating jobs. look, folks, you've lived and felthe decisions made decades ago. today we're making decisions to do this for decades to come and doing it all across america. this groundbreaking investment comes from two historic laws i signed with the support of tammy and gwen. my bipartisan infrastructure law, the most significant law to modernize our roads and bridges and so much more in generations, the most consequential investment. another law, the inflation reduction act which is the mosto

fighting climate change and events in the environment ever in history anywhere in the world. that's not hyperbole.d$ and they're already making a difference. look, let me give you one example. back in december i was in milwaukee and met with a plumber named rashon. is he here? who owns his own small hero plumbing, with hundreds of lead pipes for children and families in this community can turn on on the faucet, clean water ceshe risk of brain damage. it was supposed to take the city 60 years to eliminate these pipes to do this work and because the infrastructure law is signed we're getting all of it done, every lead pipe in this city within 10 years, gone. i was proud to have rashon as my guest at the state of the union address last week. we're delivering

clean water to every american and ear we're on the way to delivering high speed internet to every american at low costs. the communities too often left behind. we're rebuilding the roads and filling in the cracks in the sidewalk and creating places to live and safely and to breathe clean air and shop at a nearby grocery stocked with health and■#althy and fresh food. we're building more homes and apartments to bring the cost of rent down. everything we're doing is connecting people withrtunity, g people from opportunity. and we're seeing progress. through my american rescue plan we put checks in people's pockets to get them through the pandemic. we invested nearly $80 million in wisconsin for the state small business credit issue, helping countless small businesses grow.

in milwaukee, small business applications are up 70% compared to before the pandemic. small businesses make up half of our economy. we talk about big corporations, it's true, they're gigantic but if you add up all the small businesses they make up half of all gross domestic product providing good paying jobs and opportunities and everyone who applies for a small loan, it's an act of hope and the share of black and latino americans employed in milwaukee in 2022 is the highest in more than a decade. folks, wages prices and we havee lowest inflation rate of anyone in the country and we're fighting to lower it further and fighti for education costs to give a little more breathing room as my dad would say to ordinary families like the one i grew up in. let's be clear, my predecessor

is an ally including those in congress, senator ron johnson who voted -- he voted against theras this project. they want to undo everything i just talked about. my predecessor talked about infrastructure week for four years single thing done, not one. ron johnson, every republican in congress voted against the inflation reduction act helping to fund these projects and wants to repeal it. look, folks, with your help, we cut black and half because of the child tax cut through my america rescue plan. d■ ron johnson, every single republican in congress voted against that as well, every single one. i signed the law to beat big phrma by giving medicare the power to price prescription drugs and lower drug prices for seniors significantly. every republican voted against it as well. by the way, guess what?

it lowered the federal deficit by $160 billion. didn't just save money for seniors, it meant medicare didn't have to pay those exorbitant costs. for example, everybody knows somebody that needs insulin for diabetes. guess what? just lowering the price to $35 only costs $10 to make, by the way, instead of $400 a month, saved the government all that money. now they're trying to cut medicare and medicaid and social security. wisconsin's very own senator ron johnson called social security, get this one, i'm amazed, called social security a ponzi scheme. i'm serious, think about it. did you ever think you'd hear anybody say that? a ponzi scheme? give me a break. you know, just this week donald trump said cut the social security and medicararble. when i asked if he'd change his

position he said, quote, there's a lot we can do in terms of cutting, a tremendous amount of things we can i want to assure you, i will never allow it to happen. i won't cut social security. i will not cut medicare. instead of cutting social security and medicare to give tax breaks to the superwealthy, i can spendcurity and medicare and make the wealthy begin to pay their fair share. look, folks, let me close with i came to office, our country was hit by the worst pandemic and economic crisis in a century. remember the fear and anxietyso@ everybody felt? record job losses, raging virus that would take more than one million american lives and for everyst, it is estimated eight close family behind, children, mother, father, aunts. a mental health crisis of

isolation and loneliness, a president my predecessor who failed the most basic duty every president owes the american people, just to care, the duty to care. in my view that's unforgivable. ito office to continue to uphold a duty to get us through one of the toughest periods in our nation's history. we have. and now we're building the future of america full of possibilities, building an economy from the middle out and the bottom up and not the top down. the top down stuff, not a lot landedn my dad's kitchen table growing up. investing in all of america and all americans to make sure everyone has a fair shot. we'll eody behind. look, our plan is working. america is coming back. that's america. that's what this project is all about, the and justice and prosperity and unlimited possibilities. that's why i swear to god, i've never been more optimistic about america's future today, not because i'm president but because we're at a inflection

point in history, we really are. things are going to change no matter who is president in a big way, they'll change either for the better or much worse. all we have to do, folks, is remember who in god's we're thef america. the only major country in the world that's stronger than whee went in. there's nothing beyond our capacity. i mean this sincerely, think about it, there's nothing beyond america's capacity if we do it together. and that's what we're going to do. may god bless yol our troops. thank you so much. ♪ [captions copyright national cable sallite corp. 2023] ♪/s