The Left has long understood the principle that there’s no such thing as a free lunch. In politics, that especially applies to money — it always comes with a condition.
This is partly why the avowed leftists and their Republican allies in the establishment fight so hard to keep big spending flowing in D.C. Every federal “grant” and “loan,” however seemingly benign, is a way for the government — and those pulling the strings of the government — to control the recipients of that money.
Even as Democrats rightfully acknowledge the need for the U.S. to become competitive in the production of semiconductors — especially as China makes its antagonism to the United States ever more clear — the White House isn’t missing the opportunity to use this effort to further their agenda.
This concern is being brought forward by Republicans on Capitol Hill, who say the administration is using $39 billion in taxpayer funding meant to build microchip factories to instead push “woke” policies.
These allegedly woke policies include requiring that the recipients of these funds offer child care to their employees and encourage their workers to join labor unions.
“What President Biden is doing by jamming woke and green agenda items into legislation we pass is making it harder for him to ever get legislation passed again,” said Senator Mitt Romney (R-Utah), per the Associated Press.
The funding is part of the CHIPS and Science Act, which Joe Biden signed into law in August. In addition to the $39 billion for factory building, the legislation dedicates $11 billion for research.
Computer chips, a term often used interchangeably with “semiconductors,” are used in everything from advanced weaponry to cars to toys. They are integrated circuits that manage the flow of electrical currents.
In this age of computers and information technology, semiconductors are essential to our very way of life, and the firms and countries that produce them wield great influence and power on the world stage.
This is why rising tensions with China have at last convinced America’s foreign policymakers that the United States must develop its own self-sufficient semiconductor industry.
The global community, including the United States, is heavily reliant on Taiwan (officially the Republic of China) for its crucial semiconductor manufacturing sector. If Communist China were to take over the small nation — as it continues to threaten to do — it would gain additional leverage over America and its allies.
Presently, Taiwan is responsible for the vast majority of semiconductor production globally, accounting for 63 percent of output. By comparison, the United States made up just 12 percent of semiconductor production in 2019, while China supplied 16 percent.
A strong U.S. semiconductor industry would not only be a boon to American independence and national security; it would also bring much-needed jobs to our own citizens. According to a report by the Semiconductor Industry Association, announced projects dependent on the possibility of government support would create an estimated 200,000 jobs — including 36,000 directly involving computer chips.
Amid these realities, support for the CHIPS Act was bipartisan, with 17 Republican Senators and 24 House Republicans voting for the legislation.
But now members of the GOP caucus are worried that the administration is more concerned with using these funds to further a woke agenda than with fulfilling the law’s stated aim.
According to AP, Senator Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said he voted to “give us the capabilities that we don’t have,” not the “union agenda,” and another Republican, Senator John Cornyn of Texas, lamented that “when the administration does things like that, it really undermines our ability to work together in a bipartisan basis to pass legislation.”
But the White House and its allies defend the child-support provisions. AP notes:
An administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations, said no prospective applicant has complained about the child care provision. The official added that TSMC and Samsung — two possible applicants — already provide child care at their facilities in Taiwan and South Korea, respectively.
Researchers at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a think tank focused on national security, described the child care provisions as necessary for the “fabs,” the chip industry’s term for factories.
“It is not, as some have wrongly argued, an issue of social policy,” wrote Sujai Shivakumar and Charles Wessner, both at CSIS. “It is a pragmatic move, clearly aligned with the nation’s security interests, to grow the workforce necessary to get the fabs built and producing the chips on which our country runs.”
Apparently, the Republicans who voted for the bill and are now ruing the use of taxpayer dollars to pay for wokeism never heard the phrase “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.”
They should have known that Democrats always try to use public funds for their own benefit, anticipated that they would do the same with this bill, and fought to include provisions against wokeism in the bill before agreeing to sign it.
But, as Einstein said: “Intellectuals solve problems. Geniuses prevent them.”
The career politicians of the Republican caucus are no geniuses.
