[Congressional Record Volume 170, Number 49 (Wednesday, March 20, 2024)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2449-S2450]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                         Chips and Science Act

  Mr. President, now on something near and dear to my heart, chips--
chips in America. Today, President Biden

[[Page S2450]]

will be in Phoenix, AZ, to roll out a colossal $8.5 billion grant to 
Intel to expand its chip production here in America, a historic sum 
made possible by the Chips and Science Act, something I was proud to 
author and push.
  Today's ``Chips'' announcement lands like a thunderclap: $8.5 
billion; 10,000 manufacturing jobs; 20,000 construction jobs; thousands 
upon thousands of indirect jobs; $100 billion in private investment. 
And the ripple effects will be felt across a huge swath of the country: 
from Oregon to Arizona, to New Mexico, to Ohio. These are just some of 
the places where a golden new age of American chip production will 
manifest itself.
  And today's announcement comes about a month after GlobalFoundries in 
New York received its own billion-and-a-half-dollar award to expand 
their legacy chip production and further make New York State a global 
hub for chip manufacturing. And we expect more soon for companies like 
Micron in central New York. You will hear good announcements about 
that, I believe, soon enough.
  One announcement at a time, we are keeping our promise of bringing 
manufacturing back to America and making the United States the leader 
in microchip production once again.
  And let me be clear. This isn't the tech revolution of yesterday. 
This is something entirely different and entirely new. When people in 
the future think ``tech,'' it won't be just enough to mention places 
like Silicon Valley anymore. They will think of the Silicon Heartland.
  Because of Chips and Science, the story of American innovation will 
now happen in places like New Albany, OH, where Intel is building its 
Ohio One facility. This one facility will create 3,000 new jobs and 
7,000 union construction jobs. These jobs will pay exceedingly well, 
and not all are going to require college degrees.
  Along with Senators Cantwell, Kelly, Warner, Wyden, and so many of my 
Republican colleagues, too, I want to take a moment to applaud Senator 
Brown for making Chips and Science happen. Thanks to my good friend 
Sherrod Brown, these jobs in New Albany will be good-paying union jobs. 
Because Sherrod Brown worked with the administration and worked with 
Intel, Intel is using a project labor agreement for the deal, which 
makes sure the workers building this fab are well prepared and well 
compensated.
  It is not just that Intel will directly hire thousands of new 
workers. The benefits will also extend to universities across the 
region, especially HBCUs. It will benefit other industries, like the 
auto industry. This investment will help generate a pipeline of highly 
skilled tech workers right in the heart of Ohio, as well as Arizona, 
New Mexico, and Oregon. And the benefits will spread across communities 
that have long been overlooked and have long been waiting for a second 
chance. And this is what so many of us here in the Senate envisioned 
when we wrote Chips and Science. I thought of this years ago. I worked 
with Senator Young. It took us a long time to convince people how 
important this was. But today's announcement by Intel, the one that was 
announced last month in Upstate New York--and many others to come--our 
faith in this bill is being vindicated in terms of jobs and in terms of 
leadership, not only in chip manufacturing but in science.

  So many of us envisioned this when we wrote Chips and Science--a 
cascade of public investment that in turn creates a fountain of private 
sector activity. Today's announcement is perhaps the clearest signal 
yet that Chips and Science is delivering. In the long run, these are 
the investments we need to keep America safe, keep America competitive, 
keep America a world leader for innovation in manufacturing in the 
future.
  America was the envy of the world for much of the 20th century 
precisely because of our ambitions in technological innovation and 
manufacturing.
  When I started working on what I then called endless frontiers a few 
years back--we retitled it ``CHIPS and Science'' because too many 
people thought endless frontiers had something to do with covered 
wagons--I did it because I knew we had to keep America competitive, and 
it would take an immense investment by the Federal Government. Other 
countries were investing. If we didn't, we would have fallen way, way 
behind, much to the detriment of industries across America because so 
many depend on chips and much to the detriment of our national security 
because not only does our defense industry depend on chips, but if they 
are made overseas, foreign countries might have sway over us 
economically and foreign policy-wise.
  It has taken a while to get here, but the results are truly, truly 
paying off, and I am excited and feel vindicated about all the work we 
put into this. So I want to thank President Biden for his leadership in 
making today's announcement possible. President Biden understood the 
need to do this immediately when we talked to him about it, and his 
administration--particularly Commerce Secretary Raimondo--has done a 
great job negotiating with the companies, as today's announcement 
shows.
  Finally, another shout out to Sherrod Brown, who understood the 
importance of bringing chip manufacturing to Ohio for its auto industry 
and for so much else in projecting a future for a strong manufacturing 
base in Ohio.