House Transportation Chair Sam Graves (R-Mo.) announced this week that he is targeting April 29 as the start date for efforts to reauthorization the surface transportation bill and is negotiating a topline number between $500 billion and $550 billion, Politico reports. The bill would cover a five-year period that starts on October 1, 2026.
If that number holds, the bill would match the $550 billion included in the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure act for roads, bridges, and transit. That legislation totaled $1.2 trillion and also included funding for broadband, climate resilience and water infrastructure. Graves has said he wants the upcoming bill to be more traditional than the previous one with more focus on roads and bridges.
Graves said he is in active talks with ranking member Rick Larsen (D-Wash.) and that he thinks Larsen “wants a little bit more” in funding. A spokesperson for Larsen confirmed he wants a higher number than $550 billion.
Graves intends to include in the bill a registration fee for electric vehicles, a long-sought goal of his. The federal gas tax is considered a user fee and is the primary source of revenue for the Highway Trust Fund which funds much of the surface transportation infrastructure. Graves believes that all vehicles that benefit from the national highway system should pay an equivalent share of the costs of maintaining and expanding that system. Last year, he succeeded in inserting a $250 registration fee for EVs and $100 fee for hybrids in the House version of the GOP-led budget reconciliation bill, but those provisions never made it into law. He said the EV fee will be different this time around.
“We lowered it a little bit,” Graves said of the EV fee, though he did not provide an exact figure. As for a registration fee on hybrid cars, he was less clear: “We’re not sure yet, but yes, probably.”