中国公司抢夺美国基建项目？

And as you know, ABC News is always looking for ways to bring American jobs back to America.  So, this week, it was shocking to learn so many great infrastructure projects are under way in America, rebuilding bridges and roads in American cities, but they've hired Chinese firms and Chinese workers.  Why?

20/20" anchor Chris Cuomo is the captain of our bringing America back team and he decided to track down those people who made these decisions.

Rebuilding America's crumbling infrastructure is now a priority.

Help us rebuild this bridge, help us rebuild America, help us put construction workers back to work.

In New York, a $400 million renovation of Alexander Hamilton Bridge;In California, a whopper, a $7.2 billion new bridge to connect San Francisco and Oakland; In Alaska, a proposed $190 million bridge project.Sounds like a great opportunity for government spending to actually lead to real jobs. The problem: Much of the work is going to Chinese government-owned contracting firms.

When we're subsidizing jobs in China, we're not creating any wealth in the United States.

In Alaska, outraged union workers took to the airwaves with an obvious point : This is not the time to send more jobs to China, our tax dollars provide hundreds of jobs there, not at home.

US law actually requires major infrastructure projects to buy America when the cost difference is reasonable. In California, US firms say they would have met those guidelines but state officials decided to turn down federal money for a major part of the bridge, allowing a Chinese company at cost of almost 3,000 American jobs, and potential $1 billion boost to the struggling California economy.

It would've had a multiplying effect, because it would have not only given thousands of Californians jobs ,but also the subsequent spending would have been reinvested back in our economy.

Is this the best way to bring America back?

We went to Californian officials who claimed the Chinese could do the work faster and cheaper.

Why can't the Americans do it as quickly as Chinese, what makes them so special?

One issue that you will consistently hear, every time you go to a fabrication site this country is that they struggle at this point in time to obtain welders. That is an issue in this country.

So can you say that you guys have done everything you can to keep jobs here and building this bridge?

Absolutely.

But would American companies have done it, Chris, for a little less money and tried to race it along.

The US firms say absolutely.  They say they could have done this job.  And there's a bigger point here. It's not a level playing field, the Chinese firms are state-owned. They don't pay their workers as much. That's why the Buy America laws were passed, if states can get around them, Diane, we never bring America back, you have to enforce the laws to let American companies play.