Bipartisan Innovation Act Conference Update

For more than a month, the Joint House-Senate Conference Committee for the Bipartisan Innovation Act has worked behind the scenes to reconcile the differences between the Senate-passed U.S. Innovation and Competitiveness Act and the House-passed America COMPETES bills. Congressional leaders gave the conference until July to complete conference committee negotiations. According to media reports, the conference committee has slimmed-down the bill by removing labor, climate, and trade provisions from the America COMPETES Act from the final conference bill. High-skilled immigration provisions have also been removed from consideration in a final bill.

While conference committee negotiations continue, a bipartisan bill was recently introduced in the House of Representatives. Representatives Haley Stevens (D-MI), Dan Kildee (D-MI), Michael Waltz (R-FL), and Anthony Gonzalez (R-OH) introduced the Creating Helpful Initiatives to Produce Personnel in Needed Growth Industries, or the CHIPPING Act (H.R. 8251). This bill seeks to build a strong and diverse semiconductor chip workforce. The bill would allow the Director of the National Science Foundation to establish traineeship programs for graduate students who pursue microelectronics research. Award funds would go to institutions of higher education or non-profit organizations and funds would be used for tuition and fees and stipends for students receiving traineeships. As well as facilitating opportunities for internship programs. The bill also encourages the NSF Director to increase opportunities for microelectronics research for students in existing programs. A press release and text of the bill can be found here.