WASHINGTON (Washington Insider Magazine) – As senators raced to complete work on a significant objective of the Biden administration, a bill intended to promote more semiconductor manufacturers to establish chip operations in the United States passed the Senate on Wednesday.
The $280 billion package, which is up for a vote in the House, offers tax advantages and government assistance to businesses that build chip manufacturing facilities in the United States. Additionally, the legislation instructs Congress to dramatically expand funding for high-tech research initiatives, which lawmakers claim would help the nation maintain its economic competitiveness in the following years.
According to ABC NEWS, the Senate voted 64-33 in favor of approval. As lawmakers aim to finish up their work before going back to their home districts and states in August, the House vote is anticipated for later this week.
House speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat from California, has stated that she is convinced there is enough backing from the GOP to overcome any Democratic dissenters who see the subsidy push to promote semiconductor businesses as an inappropriate priority.
Republicans made up 17 of the yes votes. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, dissented from the Democrats and voted against the legislation.
The law’s supporters assert that other nations are paying billions of dollars to entice chipmakers. Supporters argue that the U.S. must follow suit or risk losing a reliable supply of the semiconductors that power some of the military’s most cutting-edge weaponry as well as computers, cars, refrigerators, and other electronic devices.
The legislation, according to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-New York, is one of the country’s greatest recent investments in manufacturing and science.
The cost of the law has drawn criticism from its opponents. Over a ten-year period, it is predicted to raise government deficits by around $79 billion.
The bill, according to President Joe Biden, would reduce prices on everything from vehicles to dishwashers while also creating employment.
The plan has been in the works for years, ever since Schumer and Senator Todd Young, R-Ind., pushed for increased government funding for high tech R&D. While the legislation has undergone a number of changes, Lawmakers consistently emphasized during the discussion on Wednesday the necessity to stay up with China’s significant expenditures in cutting-edge technology.
The law offers a 25 percent tax credit to businesses who invest in chip factories in the United States in addition to more than $52 billion in grants as well as other benefits for the semiconductor industry. Although Congress will need to follow through by authorizing that money in future budget bills, it calls for additional expenditure on different research projects that would total nearly $200 billion over 10 years.
The future of the law, despite years of labor, did not seem so bright about a month ago. Mitch McConnell, the leader of the Senate Republicans, then tweeted that there wouldn’t be any semiconductor legislation as long as Democrats were pushing their party’s platform on economic and energy reforms. In the Senate, GOP backing is essential to obtaining the 60 votes required to end a filibuster.
However, top Republicans claimed that the rejection of the concept of raising taxes on the wealthy and businesses by Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia provided a window of opportunity for moving forward on semiconductors. The Biden administration, however, worked to enact a law before the August recess, even if doing so required significantly reducing its original scope to only the $52 billion in microchip incentives.
Gina Raimondo, the secretary of commerce, told legislators that semiconductor manufacturers were preparing strategies to satisfy the rising demand for chips. She said that the sector would continue to expand whether or not the United States was involved, and if lawmakers didn’t take action fast, these businesses would just decide to operate in other nations that offered substantial financial advantages.
After McConnell’s remarks, according to Schumer, he called the CEOs of chipmakers and corporations like Ford and General Motors to ask them to make contact with “unlikely allies” like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Business Roundtable. He pushed them to tell Republican senators how essential the bill was.
The bill may be debated by the House as soon as Thursday. While the majority of Republicans are predicted to reject it, the legislation has the support of several of the top Republicans on national security committees, including Reps. John Katko of New York, Michael Turner of Ohio, and Michael McCaul of Texas. The Problem Solvers Caucus, a bipartisan group made up of moderates from both parties, includes several Republicans as well.
