Including Certain Computer-Related Projects in the Federal Permitting Program Under Title Xli of the Fast Act

Floor Speech

Mr. Speaker, I, too, rise in support of S. 3451. However, when we start sacrificing regular order to score political points, we are on an extremely slippery slope. Unfortunately, that is the course this bill sets us on.

It didn't move through the Committee on Natural Resources, the committee of jurisdiction. Instead, it was one of the many promises made by Democrat leadership to secure the votes they needed in the Senate to pass the CHIPS-Plus Act.

The irony of this, Mr. Speaker, is yesterday we were in an all-day long markup in the Natural Resources Committee on Chairman Grijalva's Environmental Justice for All Act, which is a bill that really doubles down on NEPA regulations. Obviously, we have differences of opinion on that, but we were having the debate. Democrats wanted to increase NEPA regulations, Republicans wanted to streamline regulations.

So you can imagine the shock when Chairman Grijalva's staff, almost simultaneously with my staff, told us to be prepared tomorrow afternoon because there is going to be a NEPA streamlining bill on the suspension calendar.

When I was told the bill was being added, I thought to myself, this bill didn't go through regular order, and this is something my colleagues across the aisle would normally really be opposed to. So I Googled the bill, and it turns out that S. 3451 is but a bargaining chip in the larger CHIPS debate.

This is what I found on the internet. It said, ``From yesterday's Roll Call, as they reported on the CHIPS-Plus package.'' A quote from that is: ``One of the Republicans who voted for the bill . . . had sought an amendment to fast track the permitting process for companies building semiconductor plants . . . instead he was promised that the House would clear his Senate-passed bill.''

This legislation, S. 3451, provides modest permit streamlining to expedite reviews of infrastructure projects concerning semiconductors, artificial intelligence and machine learning, high-performance computing and advanced computer hardware and software, quantum information science and technology, data storage, and data management, or cybersecurity.

Mr. Speaker, I strongly support streamlining. In fact, for the last 18 months, Republicans on the Committee on Natural Resources have been calling to move legislation that would streamline the onerous NEPA process, cut bureaucratic red tape, and fight back against environmental activist litigants, the kinds of meaningful actions Congress needs to take to move our country forward.

I woke up this morning, and I was reading online my local newspaper back home. There was actually a story about the CHIPS Act that talked about this very bill that we have on the suspension calendar today. I found it interesting that someone from the Sierra Club was interviewed about it.

Now, normally if you are going to streamline NEPA, it sets Sierra Club's hair on fire, and they are calling all of their activists and putting alerts out. But it was interesting that on this one, the Sierra Club was going to study the text a little bit more, even though we are here this afternoon passing this on suspension.

These commonsense Republican solutions are crucial to improving the health of our Federal lands, repairing our crumbling infrastructure, constructing water storage projects needed to make our Western communities more resilient to drought, and developing America's domestic resources to secure our supply chain and our country.

In response, Democrats have repeatedly told us we were gutting bedrock environmental laws, and that we support pillaging the land from sea to shining sea.

Just yesterday, I spent, as I mentioned, over 10 hours in a Committee on Natural Resources markup where the Democrats advanced a bill--we not only debated it; we marked it up and advanced it--a bill to expand NEPA, create more burdensome red tape, and handcuff our great Nation from future development.

Now, today, after years of committee Republicans hearing how we are trying to destroy America, suddenly the exact same commonsense streamlining and reasonable sideboards on frivolous litigation are necessary to build semiconductor plants and America's future.

This bill is only part of the solution. While building domestic chip manufacturing facilities is important and we want to bring those jobs to the United States for American workers, the reality is there is not much domestic about a chip made with 100 percent foreign materials.

For instance, today, the United States is 100 percent reliant on other countries to meet our demand for gallium and indium, both of which are needed in semiconductors. China is the lead supplier for both.

Semiconductors also require a mineral called bismuth, 90 percent of which the U.S. imports. Again, China is the lead supplier to the U.S. of bismuth.

Semiconductors are among dozens of high-tech commodities, such as satellites, electric vehicles, and missile defense systems reliant on mineral resources to function. China unquestionably controls the market on nearly every one of the necessary minerals.

If we truly want to secure the supply chain for semiconductors and the huge array of other products dependent on critical minerals, it is imperative to ensure a robust domestic mining industry through an efficient, predictable mine permitting system here in the United States.

While the bill before us is a step in the right direction, it does not address the supply chain necessary to build our domestic high-tech manufacturing technology.

Republicans have the solutions. To name a few: H.R. 2604, the Accessing America's Critical Mineral Act, introduced by Congressman Pete Stauber, reforms onerous and duplicative steps in the critical mineral permitting process by requiring Federal agencies to adhere to timelines and improve coordination.

H.R. 2637, the American Critical Minerals Independence Act, introduced by Congressmen Michael Waltz and Paul Gosar, invests in recycling technologies and innovative mining and processing techniques, streamlines the permitting of critical minerals production, and requires that agencies analyze the mineral potential of Federal lands.

If Democrats were serious about streamlining and promoting a robust domestic manufacturing sector for semiconductors and other high-tech applications, they would be bringing these bills and others to the floor.

Mr. Speaker, S. 3451 is a modest step in the right direction, and I support the passage of this bill. Now that it appears Democrats have seen the error of their ways and they suddenly have done a 180 on streamlining environmental bureaucracy, I look forward to working with each and every Member who votes for this bill to advance many other Republican solutions to further address streamlining and secure a robust domestic critical minerals supply chain.

Unfortunately, while I would like to say that, with Democrats' newfound support of streamlining, the remaining Republican solutions will be coming to the floor quickly, something tells me Democrats' willingness to ignore environmental extremists and bring up commonsense policy solutions like S. 3451 has a lot more to do with politics than making good policy.

Mr. Speaker, I urge adoption of this bill, and I reserve the balance of my time.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. WESTERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I urge adoption of this bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source