[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 72 (Monday, May 2, 2022)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2240-S2241]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                              The Economy

  Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, for generations, manufacturing was the 
lifeblood of communities across Ohio and throughout the country. It was 
heavily unionized. The jobs paid well. It is not a coincidence that 
those two things go together. We know carrying a union card means 
better wages, better hope in retirement benefits, and more control over 
the workers' schedule.
  These jobs allowed generations of Americans to build a middle-class 
life. But beginning in the seventies and eighties, we stopped making 
things in this country. Look at places like my hometown of Mansfield, 
OH. I went to Johnny Appleseed Junior High School, Mansfield Senior 
High School. I walked the halls with sons and daughters of autoworkers 
from GM and machinists of Ohio Brass and electrical workers from 
Westinghouse and rubber workers from Mansfield Tire and hundreds and 
hundreds of the sons and daughters of people in the building trades--
laborers and pipe fitters and carpenters and millwrights and painters 
and one trade after another. Companies like Westinghouse and Tappan 
Stove all closed down one after another. Go to any town in Ohio and 
throughout the industrial Midwest and people can name a similar list.
  We know what happened: Corporations in Ohio shut down production in 
Mansfield, my hometown, or Lorain, where I was today, or Youngstown or 
Cincinnati or Toledo, in search of cheaper labor, in search of right-
to-work States, and in search of weaker workers' compensation or 
unemployment benefit laws. They moved to Alabama. They moved to 
Tennessee. They moved to Arkansas.
  And then, that wasn't quite good enough. Then those same corporations 
lobbied Congress for trade agreements and tax treatments. So they then 
moved on to Mexico, and that labor wasn't quite cheap enough, and they 
moved on to China.
  Ohio has paid the price for years in the form of lost jobs and lost 
opportunities. Now--and I know what the Presiding Officer has seen in 
the State of Maine. You understand this. The whole country pays the 
price--higher prices, supply chain delays, losing entire high-tech 
industries to competitors like China.
  Look where we've ended up. In Ohio, Thomas Edison invented the light 
bulb. Today, 99 percent of LED bulbs are made in China.
  America invented the semiconductor. Forty years ago, the U.S. 
produced half of the world's semiconductors. Today it is 10 percent--
about 75 percent made in East Asia. Look what happened. During the 
pandemic, companies across Ohio and the rest of the country shut down 
production lines not because there wasn't demand, they shut down 
production lines and laid off workers because they couldn't get enough 
semiconductors.
  Whether you are Ford in Lima, Whirlpool in Clyde, Kenworth in 
Chillicothe, OH, or Navistar in Springfield, you need these chips.
  It is why the Senate must fund the bipartisan CHIPS Act. We agreed to 
authorize this program. Now it is time to move and to fund it.
  At the end of January, Senator Portman and I flew to Columbus to join 
Intel to announce the largest ever domestic investment in semiconductor 
manufacturing. It will create 10,000 good-paying jobs. Union 
tradespeople--5,000 union tradespeople--for 10 years will build this 
facility. Think of the magnitude of that. As we were flying in on the 
plane, I remember sitting with the Secretary of Commerce and Senator 
Portman and my friend Don Graves, from Cleveland--the No. 2 guy at 
Commerce.
  I looked out, and I said:

       Today, in Ohio, we are finally burying the term ``Rust 
     Belt.''

  It is possible because we are on the verge of passing this historic 
investment. The EU, China, Taiwan, and South Korea are all for 
providing incentives to make these chips domestically. None of them--
none of them--require stock warrants as this motion would have us do. 
That is why I oppose this motion. Other countries are mimicking what we 
are doing. The EU, if Congress doesn't move quickly on the CHIPS Act, 
is already trying to attract that business there.
  In the history of the United States, the only time we have ever 
required equity warrants from private companies is during times of war 
or in moments of financial and global crisis. It is not a bailout; it 
is an incentive. This motion to instruct conferees is well-intentioned, 
but it won't work. It will make the U.S. program less competitive. It 
is likely to cause these companies to make these chips overseas where 
they can get the same incentives without those strings.
  I understand Senator Sanders' goal. It is a goal I share. I just 
spoke with the Presiding Officer, and neither of us has a particularly 
favorable attitude toward what we have seen with stock buybacks and the 
damage that they have done to our economy and what it has meant in the 
undermining of companies' investments in their workers and in new 
product lines. I have had--I don't know--6, 8, 10, 12 calls with the 
Chair of the Federal Reserve, Jay Powell, asking him--pleading with 
him--about restricting some of the stock buybacks at some of the 
largest American banks, especially during the pandemic.
  As I said, I understand Senator Sanders' goal. We have got to make 
sure that the jobs that are created are good-paying ones where workers 
can build careers. That is why, in the CHIPS Act, we require the chips 
funding go to the construction or to the modernization of U.S. 
facilities to support American jobs, require chip applicants to make 
commitments to workers and community investments, and require chips 
projects be sustainable without additional Federal funding. These are 
initial Federal investments that generate long-term, well-paying jobs.
  In both the Senate and House competition bills, we also require chips 
recipients to pay the prevailing wage to employees or contractors. That 
is why the United Auto Workers supports this position. They support 
chip funding. It is why the building trades support chips funding and 
oppose this Sanders' motion.
  I can tell you, from experience, if we drive these semiconductor jobs 
away, the alternative is not a replacement with other similarly high-
quality jobs. Ohio has had that promise too often. Drive around Ohio, 
and you will see the alternative to low-wage, anti-union, big-box 
stores where workers have little control over their schedules and 
little power to build a better life.
  It is also important to remember that this investment isn't just for 
semiconductors. It will affect smaller supply companies and their 
supply chains. It will affect all of the downstream industries that 
rely on these chips for all kinds of productions: appliances, auto, 
energy deployment. Our clean energy, independent future is going to 
rely on American-made semiconductor chips.
  Mr. President, I want to talk on one other motion that will be made 
in the next 48 hours, on this floor, to the CHIPS Act.
  We need to make more in this country. We shouldn't be taking other 
actions that discourage domestic production.
  I urge my colleagues to oppose a motion to instruct that supports a 
broad exclusion process for 301 tariffs for goods from China. Those 
tariffs are in place because of China's unfair trade practices 
targeting our industrial base and Ohio jobs. The AFL-CIO opposes it. 
The U.S. Trade Rep's office opposes it, and she was confirmed here in a 
unanimous vote. The Alliance for American Manufacturing opposes it. 
They know that any removal of these tariffs needs to be part of a 
broader, strategic approach to trade policy with China.
  We can't let China undermine the investments that American 
manufacturers make in workers and communities here in the United 
States. If we do this bill right, it will mean we will finally make 
more in America. We will begin bringing back the supply chains to our 
country. It will help us bury the term ``Rust Belt'' once and for all.
  When you love this country, you fight for the people who make it 
work. That is what the CHIPS Act is about. It is about workers. It is 
about good-paying jobs. It is about increasing the unionization of 
workers in this country. It will lift all boats.
  I yield the floor.

[[Page S2241]]

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Ohio.

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