On Wednesday night, Gov. Jim Justice used his final State of the State to take a victory lap, recounting his administration’s greatest hits and biggest priorities. And he was especially happy to highlight infrastructure, as he invited three state highway workers to unfurl a large banner with a map of $13.4 billion in state investments since he took office.
“I want you to look at the number of projects and where they are,” Justice said, citing initiatives like Roads to Prosperity, a program which issued $1.6 billion of state bonds to build and improve roads and bridges, and has supported more than 1,000 projects. “They’re everywhere. They’re blooming everywhere.”
But absent from Justice’s proud discussion of the state’s infrastructure investments was any mention of the flood of federal money that has made it possible — much of it backed by the Biden administration that the governor has strongly criticized.
Since 2020, the Biden administration has backed several pandemic relief programs and major infrastructure laws that have directly given states money for projects. All told, the effort has injected more than $8 billion into West Virginia, one of the nation’s poorest states where infrastructure investments are badly needed.
And that federal money is funding some significant projects. $1.2 billion from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, for example, is being used to transform broadband access in the state. The same law is also funding nearly $4 billion in road and bridge investments. And Form Energy’s Weirton battery plant, one of the most high-profile economic development projects in the state, is largely the result of federal incentives and credits provided through the Inflation Reduction Act, a clean energy measure that Justice previously said Sen. Joe Manchin made “a bad, bad move” in supporting.
As he prepares to run for the U.S. Senate, the governor escalated his criticism of the Biden administration and presented himself as someone who would vote against Biden’s policies in Congress.
In November, Justice tweeted that “Joe Biden has failed on every front, and West Virginia is paying the price.” Earlier this month, he tweeted that Biden’s “reckless and radical economic policies” had contributed to various problems, including the mortgage crisis. But Wednesday, he had no problems touting the investments that these same policies have helped create.
A spokesperson for the governor did not respond to an emailed request for comment.
Politics aside, Justice is right to discuss infrastructure, which has been an issue in West Virginia for decades with limited state investment. The American Society of Civil Engineers gave the state’s infrastructure a D grade in 2020, saying that drinking water, roads and bridges were all in serious need of improvement.
“Much of the state’s infrastructure constructed over the past 70 years has deteriorated, while new construction, replacement, rehabilitation and repair efforts have not kept pace with the needs,” the report stated.