Key Republican 'Trusts' Biden on Infrastructure Deal  

WASHINGTON - A key U.S. Republican lawmaker said Sunday he takes President Joe Biden at his word that he has no intention of vetoing a $1.2 trillion infrastructure measure Biden agreed to last week even though initially the U.S. leader said he would reject it if Congress does not also approve social spending legislation. 

Senator Mitt Romney of Utah, one of the five Republican centrists who negotiated the infrastructure package with Biden to repair the country’s deteriorating roads and bridges, told CNN, “I do trust the president” to sign the funding measure if Congress approves it alone in the coming months.  Biden created confusion about his support for the politically bipartisan roads-and-bridges bill by first saying Thursday he had agreed to the deal with the handful of opposition lawmakers. Shortly after, Biden said he would veto it if it was not passed by Congress in tandem with trillions more in spending on expanding the social safety for U.S. families and advancing the use of clean energy.   On Saturday, Biden said that his comments “created the impression that I was issuing a veto threat on the very plan I had just agreed to, which was certainly not my intent.”