"I'm here to tell you that your country has your back," said the Democratic president in front of the wreckage of the Francis Scott Key bridge.
President Joe Biden, who is campaigning for re-election and in competition with his predecessor Donald Trump, assured that by the end of May a new channel will be created to restore access to the port of Baltimore, one of the busiest in the country .
A temporary shipping corridor was opened earlier in the week to allow the passage of vessels involved in rescue and relief operations, but it is not wide enough to allow the passage of large commercial ships.
"I saw from above the bridge that collapsed, but on the ground I saw a united community," added the US president, who flew over the area by helicopter. "We will make sure that everything is paid for," he said, urging Congress to support his project for full financing. "We will move heaven and earth to rebuild this bridge as quickly as possible."
The 81-year-old Democratic president, who is trying to curry favor with the working-class electorate, also promised that reconstruction would be done with "American labor and steel" in the spirit of his industrial recovery policies which he hopes will allows him to gain an advantage over Donald Trump in the November election.
The president also paid tribute to the deceased workers, all immigrants, from Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras, distancing himself, in this way, from the increasingly violent rhetoric of his Republican opponent on the topic of immigration.
Baltimore is the American port through which the most new cars pass, over 800,000 last year, whether they are vehicles manufactured in the United States and exported internationally, or, conversely, imported foreign vehicles.
It is expected that the reconstruction of the Baltimore bridge, located 64 kilometers north of Washington, will take up to three years.
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