The Senate convened at 10:00 A.M. and is expected to take an important procedural vote on a bill that would authorize more than $50 billion in subsidies and tax credits for U.S. chip makers. The measure, known as the Chips for America Act, is a pared-down version of a broader set of bills designed to strengthen the U.S. semiconductor industry and reduce dependence on Chinese and Taiwanese manufacturers. The Chips Act authorizes about $52 billion in grants and loans for chip manufacturers, as well as a new, four-year 25% investment tax credit for chip making. In addition to the chips money, a draft bill circulated by Senate leadership includes a 25% investment tax credit for manufacture of semiconductors and tools to create semiconductors, $500 million for an international secure communications program, $200 million for worker training and $1.5 billion for public wireless supply-chain innovation. The bill was brought on by the global shortage for semiconductors that has stunted production of a myriad of consumer products, from automobiles to smartphones to gaming consoles which could last through 2023. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-New York) has scheduled a vote to consider the bill during Tuesday’s session, after months of negotiations over a sweeping competition act stalled. Final passage of the Chips Act could come as early as next week after the Senate begins deliberations.
The Senate will also take up Judge Michelle Childs’s nomination to be a D.C. Circuit judge. The Senate will also consider the nominations of Nina Nin-Yuen Wang to be United States District Judge for the District of Colorado and Nancy L. Maldonado to be United States District Judge for the Northern District of Illinois.
The House reconvened at 10:00 A.M. and began work on H.R. 8404 – Respect for Marriage Act, which would require that someone be considered married in any state as long as the marriage was valid in the state where it was performed. The bill would also repeal the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act, which defined marriage as the union of one man and one woman and allowed states to not recognize same-sex marriages performed in other states. That law has remained on the books despite being declared unconstitutional by the Obergefell v. Hodges ruling. On Wednesday, the House is also scheduled to vote on the Right to Contraception Act, which would “protect a person’s ability to access contraceptives and to engage in contraception, and to protect a health care provider’s ability to provide contraceptives, contraception, and information related to contraception.” The two bills, and House Democrats’ urgency in moving them, are the direct result of the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade last month. In a Dear Colleague on Monday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-California) said June’s actions of the Supreme Court have had a “devastating impact” already and informed their congressional agenda. Last week, the House passed two bills that would protect access to reproductive health care, including the ability to travel across state lines for an abortion.
The House is also expected to begin consideration of H.R. 8294 – Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, Agriculture, Rural Development, Energy and Water Development, Financial Services and General Government, Interior, Environment, Military Construction, and Veterans Affairs Appropriations Act of 2023. 190 amendments have been made in order for debate on the six-bill appropriations minibus, out of more than 600 originally filed. The measure includes half of the 12 annual funding bills: Agriculture-FDA, Energy-Water, Transportation-HUD, Interior-Environment, Financial Services and Military Construction-VA.
The House may also consider nine postponed bills under suspension of the Rules.
Adam S. Olsen, Washington, D.C.
