Press Releases

Today, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the bipartisan CHIPS and Science Act with the support of Congresswoman Suzan DelBene (WA-01), which will lower costs for families, make the U.S. a global economic leader in the 21st century, and protect our national security. The bill passed the Senate earlier this week and now heads to the President’s desk to be signed into law. 

This legislation was a top priority for the DelBene-led New Democrat Coalition. Speaker Pelosi appointed her to serve on the negotiating committee to reach a deal on the legislation with the Senate.

The CHIPS and Science Act:

• Lowers costs for American consumers – by making more semiconductors chips  in America, helping end the shortage of chips that have driven up the price of everything from cars to consumer goods.
• Creates 100,000 new good-paying jobs – creates strong jobs building hi-tech manufacturing facilities here in America.
• Ends our dangerous dependence on foreign manufacturers – bringing critical semiconductor manufacturing back to America instead of overseas where it can be threatened by our adversaries.

This legislation also includes strong guardrails to ensure that these investments go straight into our economy. The bill:

• Prohibits companies from using chip funding for stock buybacks or dividend payments.
• Bars funding recipients from expanding semiconductor manufacturing in countries of concern.
• Requires strong oversight and tight Congressional control over the use of federal funds.

“Semiconductors are particularly important to Washington state’s aerospace, medical device, trucking, consumer electronics, and other industries. We need to make more of these products at home and this legislation will make critical investments to incentivize more domestic production,” said DelBene. “This bill will mean lower costs for families, better and more resilient supply chains, and an estimated 100,000 good-paying American jobs.”

The bill contains incentives to increase domestic chip production as well as a new tax credit, based on legislation DelBene introduced, to encourage companies to build plants in the United States.

“Today, the House passed a bill that will make cars cheaper, appliances cheaper, and computers cheaper.  It will lower the costs of every day goods.  And, it will create high-paying manufacturing jobs across the country and strengthen U.S. leadership in the industries of the future at the same time,” said President Biden. “The CHIPS and Science Act is exactly what we need to be doing to grow our economy right now. By making more semiconductors in the United States, this bill will increase domestic manufacturing and lower costs for families.  And, it will strengthen our national security by making us less dependent on foreign sources of semiconductors.  This bill includes important guardrails to ensure that companies receiving tax payer dollars invest in America and that union workers are building new manufacturing plants across the country. I look forward to signing this bill into law and continuing to grow our economy from the bottom up and middle out for working families all across the country.”

DelBene recently hosted a roundtable with Washington businesses impacted by the shortage. She also held a call with U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo to discuss why this legislation is so important to our state.

A fact sheet about the bill can be found here.