Transportation Sec. Pete Buttigieg: Baltimore bridge wasn't set to be replaced; can't give timeline for port reopening.

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg on Wednesday said the collapsed Baltimore bridge was not set to receive an "immediate discretionary grant" from the infrastructure law to be replaced, and he couldn’t give a timeline on when the port was expected to reopen.

“[The state of Maryland] noted it was 50 years old and they also noted that it had some questionable parts to it, but was it on the list to be replaced with the infrastructure bill?” a reporter asked Buttigieg during the White House press briefing.

“It certainly was not the subject of an immediate discretionary grant to replace it or something, anything like that,” Buttigieg said. “We do have some work going on I-895, but to my knowledge, nothing immediate in terms of any discretionary grants going to the bridge.”

The transportation secretary also told reporters that an estimated 8,000 jobs are “directly implicated” by the bridge collapse, and more than $100 million worth of cargo moves in and out of the port.

“Reopening the port is a different matter from rebuilding the bridge. The port — that's just a matter of clearing the channel. Still no simple thing, but I would expect that can happen on a much quicker timeline than the full reconstruction of the bridge,” Buttigieg said, although he declined to give a timeline.

A ship early Tuesday morning lost power and struck a support tier for the Francis Scott Key Bridge, collapsing the bridge and sending six construction workers into the water. Officials have presumed the workers have died.