The Final State of the Union
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Summary:
On Friday afternoon, President Obama and Vice President Biden stopped by a local Shake Shack for burgers, and spoke briefly about the need for Congress to pass transportation funding.
On Friday afternoon, President Obama and Vice President dropped by a local Shake Shack – a chain that has chosen to pay its employees more than 10 dollars an hour – to grab burgers with four workers who just helped complete a local infrastructure project that will help traffic in the D.C. area move faster.
The President and Vice President delivered brief remarks about the need for Congress to "do what it's supposed to do" and pass transportation funding – a move that would allow hundreds of thousands of jobs and projects that are currently reparing our crumbling roads and bridges to keep doing just that.
"This shouldn’t be Democrat or Republican," the President said. "This is American. We’ve got to rebuild America. And these are folks who are doing it."
...When you ask Americans from all walks of life all across the country what’s their number one priority, it’s improving the economy and putting people back to work. And one of the best ways we can do it is to do something about the roads, the bridges, the ports, the airports, the sewer lines all across the country that need repair.
We know we’re going to have to do it. This is like deferred maintenance on your house. If you’ve got to do some tuck-pointing to fix the roof or fix the boiler, there’s no point in putting it off. Now is the time to do it, and we’ve got outstanding contractors and workers ready to work. So I hope Congress gets working, and I’m prepared to work with anybody on a bipartisan basis to get it done.
President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden meet for lunch with four workers from a local reconstruction project, at the Dupont Circle Shake Shack in Washington, D.C., May 16, 2014. Abdullahi Mohamed, Antonio Byrd, Aidin Sarabi, and Meredith Upchurch joined the President and Vice President. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)
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