As votes were counted into the night of Nov. 5, observers were watching the tallies closely for signs, if not definitive answers, about who will win the presidency — Vice President Kamala Harris or former President Donald Trump — and which party will control the congress . Adding to the tension and uncertainty was that projections leading up to Election Day have described the White House race and multiple House and Senate contests as a toss-up.
One thing, however, that seemed likely at ENR’s late evening press time was that the Republicans would wrest the Senate majority from the Democrats.
No doubt groups, managers and workers in the construction industry were among those riveted to their screens to learn the results of other competitions. But those answers likely won’t come quickly.
“I think we can expect a long night tonight, and even more long nights next week, before we know anything decisive about this year’s election,” said Jeff Urbanchuk, senior vice president for political communications and strategic issues at the American Council of Engineering Companies.
Urbanchuk said in emailed comments to ENR that the ACEC was also “following some key races.” They include contests in which the 16 engineers now in Congress participate.
Urbanchuk says these incumbents are “champions of ACEC’s infrastructure and legislative priorities, and potential candidates who could serve in key chair roles on committees with jurisdiction over priority areas such as infrastructure, water, environment, energy, tax policy, whatever that has to do with manpower or engineering policies.”
Urbanchuk also notes that not all of this group of legislators are from ACEC’s regular purview of engineering, but rather they are all in STEM fields. It is a bipartisan group and includes three senators: Steve Daines (R-Mont.), Martin Heinrich (DN.M.) and Alejandro Padilla (D-Calif.).
In the run-up to the election, builders and associated contractors have had several broad areas of focus, “regardless of the results,” says Ben Brubeck, ABC’s vice president of regulatory, labor and state affairs.
Brubeck said in emailed comments that those topics include how the next administration will address the construction labor shortage of more than 500,000. If Trump wins, Brubeck is looking to see if he will roll back what Brubeck calls “harmful regulations” regarding workforce development. A related question is how Trump would address construction industry immigration in his overall immigration policies.
Another ABC goal is to get increased infrastructure spending, Brubeck says. He says about 60% of the funding from the Jobs and Infrastructure Investment Act “hasn’t hit the streets yet.” He says this means there will be a lot of public sector contract awards and innovations for new projects in the next four years.
With this volume of public funding, “How will private construction and development affect the health of the economy?” Brubeck asks.
ABC is also interested in whether Trump, if elected, would go on to cancel other current regulations, some that apply to construction, such as project permitting, and others that apply wide, such as a regulation of the Occupational Health and Safety Administration that clarifies the rights of employees. to authorize a representative to accompany an OSHA official during workplace inspections.
Also among ABC’s areas of interest are building material cost inflation, as well as tax policy and candidates for federal magistrates and other offices.
