(FreedomBeacon.com)- The CHIPS Act of 2022, which was passed in late July and signed into law in early August, will permit chip manufacturers who receive taxpayer subsidies to resume doing business with foreign countries including China after a ten-year waiting period.
According to guidelines released last week by the Department of Commerce, any chip manufacturer that receives federal subsidies will only be barred from “engaging in significant transactions” in China and other “countries of concern” for ten years. After that, it’s business as usual.
The primary purpose of the $280 billion CHIPS Act was to boost the domestic manufacturing of semiconductors by offering federal subsidies as a way to reduce US reliance on foreign manufacturers like China or Taiwan.
But what’s the point of dolling out taxpayer money to boost domestic production only to permit those same companies to return to depending on foreign manufacturers ten years later?
In a White House briefing last Tuesday, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo also explained that companies receiving subsidies will still be allowed to expand “known factories in China to serve the Chinese market.”
In other words, American taxpayers will foot the bill for American companies to expand in the Chinese market.
The toothless language was added to the CHIPS Act after chip giant Intel lobbied Congress to remove the restrictions on investing in China for companies receiving federal subsidies. Ultimately, Congress agreed to make the ban temporary.
What’s more, the CHIPS subsidies will be disbursed using the Biden administration’s obsessive push for so-called “equity.”
According to the Commerce Department, the CHIPS program office will “prioritize” subsidy applicants who include proposals on increasing the participation of “economically disadvantaged individuals, minority-owned businesses, veteran-owned businesses, women-owned businesses, and rural businesses in the geographic area of each project.”
