Usica

Floor Speech

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Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, during the immediate past recess, the bipartisan conference committee negotiations over the U.S. Innovation and Competition Act, otherwise known as USICA, have officially come to a screeching halt. It has been more than a year since the Senate actually passed this bill--more than a year.

Eight months later, House Democrats passed their own partisan bill, which looked more like the failed ``Build Back Broke'' agenda, rather than a serious attempt to protect our national security by countering the Chinese threat.

And earlier this summer, a conference committee was appointed and began negotiating a compromise bill that would finally fund the CHIPS Act and make other critical investments in our national security and competitiveness. Of course, the CHIPS Act was designed to try to bring back on shore American manufacturing of advanced semiconductors, which I will talk more about in a moment.

But with the CHIPS funding on the five-yard line, the majority leader, the Senator from New York, has tossed a grenade into the end zone.

And why would you possibly jeopardize such an important national security priority? Apparently, so Democrats can try to, yet again, pass their unpopular social welfare bill that doesn't even appear to have universal Democratic support. Forget the bipartisan bill to safeguard our national security; forget commonsense safeguards to protect our most critical supply chains; forget new American manufacturing jobs and big investments in States all across the country.

Senator Schumer has chosen to revive the ``Build Back Broke'' bill because we are just months from an election where polls suggest that his party is going to get swept out of control and then instead of majority leader, he will become the minority leader.

So let's take a moment to recall how we happened to get here. More than 2 years ago, Congress began working to bolster domestic semiconductor manufacturing and address a major supply chain vulnerability.

Semiconductors or microcircuits underpin all of the modern technology we depend upon every day: the cell phones in our pockets, the cars in our driveways, the tractors our farmers drive, and missile systems that our troops use abroad.

Chips keep us safe; they keep us connected; and they ensure that we have fresh food, clean water, and a way to get to work every day. The United States relies on strong supplies of semiconductors, and we lead the way in chip design, but here is the kicker. While we lead the way in chip design, we outsource the actual manufacturing abroad.

That is right. We manufacture none of the world's most advanced chips--zero.

Seventy-five percent of these chips come from East Asia, and a whopping 90 percent of them are made in Taiwan. Given the explicit threat of war by the Chinese Communist Party against Taiwan, that is a grave cause for concern.

Furthermore, having just lived through a pandemic, consider what another pandemic or natural disaster might do to disrupt the supply chain of these critical semiconductors.

And when you consider the fact that global chip demand is expected to increase by 56 percent over the next decade, it is clear that the problem is going to get worse. A major disruption in our global chip supply would halt manufacturing on everything from laptop computers to cars, to anti-tank Javelin missiles being used in Ukraine against Russian aggressors.

This is a matter of both economic and national security, which is why addressing the chip shortage has been a bipartisan priority. In 2020, 96 Senators supported passing the CHIPS for America Act as part of the national defense authorization bill. That was way back in 2020.

And it took less than 6 months from the time it became law until the Senate passed a bill to fund the CHIPS Program. That bill was called the U.S. Innovation and Competition Act passed by the Senate with a vote of 68 to 32.

Despite the broad bipartisan support for the CHIPS Program, the House refused to pass the Senate bill not because it was a bad bill, but because it wasn't a partisan grab bag that provided billions for longstanding liberal policies.

Their ``Build Back Broke'' agenda was 6 feet under, and they saw a must-pass national security bill as a convenient way to resurrect it. Their partisan legislation known as the COMPETES Act, included handouts for labor unions, a key supporter for the Democratic Party. The labor bosses were promised some pretty big benefits that never came to pass, and this was the way that House Democrats saw to respond.

They also tacked on a range of unrelated partisan provisions, like an $8 billion payment to a U.N. climate slush fund, which has provided more than $100 million to China. The stated purpose of our efforts in USICA--the United States Innovation and Competition Act--has been to counter threats from China, not to subsidize them with taxpayer dollars, which apparently is what the House has chosen to do.

Well, throughout the conference committee process, Republicans have pushed back against the long list of unrelated and downright harmful provisions.

This bill should be about safeguarding our critical supply chains and strengthening our competitiveness, not doling out partisan political favors.

Negotiations have made progress, but, frankly, we are running out of time, and time is of the essence. Last month, more than 120 tech CEOs sent a letter to congressional leaders urging quick action on this legislation.

And we are seeing signs that a failure to act will lead to these critical investments being made not in the United States but outside of the United States, just the opposite of what we hoped to attain.

A company called GlobalWafers is planning to build a silicon wafer factory in Sherman, TX, that would create up to 1,500 jobs and produce 1.2 million wafers a month. These silicon wafers are an essential component of semiconductors.

But last month, Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo said the CEO told her that the plan was contingent on Congress passing the CHIPS Act funding. Unless the funding is approved by the August recess, the company will scrap plans for the facility.

A couple of weeks ago, the CEO of Intel expressed a similar sentiment. He said the company could expand chip production in Europe instead of the United States if Congress fails to pass this funding.

So the stakes are high, as is the need to move quickly, but apparently none of that matters to the majority leader and House Democrats. They have chosen to ignore this rapidly closing window of opportunity and the national security risks associated with the current chip shortage.

They have chosen to ignore the jobs and investments this bill would bring to States all across this country. They have chosen to ignore the symphony of voices from across the spectrum who want to get this done.

And for what? Apparently, another unwanted and unnecessary partisan spending spree--this trillion-dollar proposal known as a reconciliation bill, which is a spinoff of Build Back Better, which I affectionately call ``Build Back Broke.''

This proposal would attack oil and gas producers at a time when gas prices remain at record highs, and one of the most urgent needs of everyday, working American families is to bring down the price of gasoline at the pump so they can afford to take their kids to school and go to work.

Yet the partisan reconciliation bill that the majority leader contemplates bringing up would actually make that problem worse, not better.

This partisan reconciliation bill would also increase taxes on American families, as their budgets are already being pummeled by inflation. And it could be that we are already in a recession, technically defined as two quarters of negative GDP.

Well, one thing President Obama recognized back after the great recession of 2008, is it is not a time to raise taxes, and apparently the current Biden administration did not learn that lesson, nor did the majority leader.

This bill would simply make inflation worse, not better. Why the Democratic leader has prioritized partisan politics over sound, bipartisan policy is lost on me. Why he would elevate partisanship above national security is lost on me. And why he would show contempt for the challenges families are facing due to failed policies of the Biden administration is lost on me.

But now he is doubling down. His decision to pursue this partisan reconciliation bill won't just hurt families, it risks our ability to pass critical CHIPS funding on a timely basis.

To reiterate the words of the Republican leader: There will be no bipartisan USICA as long as Democrats are pursuing their reckless tax- and-spending agenda. Our Democratic colleagues cannot spend their mornings working on a purely partisan spending spree for the next 4 weeks and expect Republicans to work with them on a bipartisan bill in the afternoon.

We simply don't have time for these antics. Bipartisan conference negotiations require compromise and confidence that the person sitting across the table from you is negotiating in good faith.

Senator Schumer's tactics have jeopardized the good faith that has driven this process up until now.

From the beginning, what was originally known as Endless Frontiers to now the U.S. Innovation and Competition Act, or USICA--this has been a big bipartisan effort.

Two years ago, I introduced the CHIPS for America Act with Senator Warner, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee on which I sit, and a Democrat. We worked in good faith to get it signed into law as part of the national defense reuthorization act. And we all worked together--68 of us--to make sure that the bill was funded through the bipartisan U.S. Innovation and Competition Act.

And more recently, I have been trying to help broker an agreement that can get this bill signed into law as part of the conference committee process. My desire to fund the CHIPS Act has not changed, but Senator Schumer's choices have taken an already difficult job and made it nearly impossible.

He is trying to turn what has been a bipartisan process into a partisan exercise. I hope the Democratic leader will reconsider and will abandon his partisan spending spree so that we can spend the next 3 weeks passing the CHIPS funding as part of the USICA with broad bipartisan support.

This is a matter of national security and economic competitiveness, and it should not become a victim of partisan games.

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