Endless Frontier Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. SCHUMER. Now, Mr. President, on the competition act, the Senate today will continue work on the bipartisan U.S. Innovation and Competition Act, legislation that will supercharge American innovation and preserve our competitive edge, not just for the next few years but for generations to come. It will be true that our children and even our grandchildren will benefit from this legislation.

Right now, this legislation doesn't get the big focus of the press-- A, because it is bipartisan; there aren't too many clashes; B, because it is positive; and, C, because it is long term. It won't have an immediate effect tomorrow, but it will have a profound effect 3, 4, 5 years from now and generations after.

So it is really important legislation. I think it is one of the most important things this Chamber has done in a very long time. And the hallmark of the bill has been its bipartisanship. It pulls together bipartisan legislation from no fewer than six Senate committees and includes the input of nearly every Member of the Senate. The vote tallies you are seeing on this bill are from another era, maybe the John Warner era--24 to 4 in the Commerce Committee, 21 to 1 in Foreign Relations. The Senate, as a whole, voted to proceed to the bill by 86 to 11.

And the process here on the floor is no less bipartisan. I have heard it from Members on both sides of the aisle: Let's try to do regular order. Let's get on the floor and do amendments the way we used to.

Well, we are doing just that. We have already considered 10 amendments--more than I can remember in a long time--8 of which were led by Republicans. So it is hardly that the Democratic majority is only doing what we want. Three Republican amendments were adopted by voice vote last night. I mean, who would have ever thought that the Senate would adopt an amendment from Senator Rand Paul by voice vote? We did it.

So, look, we are moving forward in a very bipartisan way. We will consider at least another three amendments of the bill today, and if both sides continue in good faith to schedule amendment votes and debate, and there are no eleventh-hour decisions to delay or obstruct, there is no reason we can't finish this bill by the end of the week. That is my intention.

Taking a step back, the depth of bipartisanship on this bill reveals two things. One, Members want to work together if given a chance. This bill came through the regular order. Senate committees drove the process, and here on the floor, Members have participated in robust debate and a robust amendment process. But, second, and maybe even more importantly, it reveals that Democrats and Republicans are united in our efforts to preserve and maintain American leadership on the world stage.

We all know that investing in sciences, innovation, and technology holds the key to our future--the key. It has been one of the great hallmarks of America from 1950 on, maybe even earlier, from Thomas Edison on, maybe even earlier than that. But today--today--we have let that lag. We became far too complacent. The United States commits less than 1 percent of its GDP toward basic science research--1 percent. That is the fault of government, but it is also the fault of the private sector. The world is so competitive, and global competition is so severe. Companies feel they can't invest as much in the kind of research that might payoff profits 5 or 10 years down the road.

So while all this is happening, the Chinese Communist Party spends nearly 2.5 percent on research and has pledged to the world that they will increase scientific investments by 10 percent in the future. If that happens unchallenged, the days of America leading the world in science and innovation, the days of America being the leading economic power of the world will be over, and we will regret it and look back 10 or 20 years from now and say: Why the heck didn't we do this? It was so simple and easy.

But we have to.

I heard my friend from Illinois, Senator Durbin, say that in 1990, the United States produced 37 percent of the world's semiconductors--a technology we invented. Today, we produce less than 12 percent, and it is going down. Some have predicted--many have predicted--that at this rate, we will produce less than 6 percent of them a few years from now. If we don't step up our game right now, we will fall behind the rest of the world.

That is what this legislation is ultimately about--righting the ship, investing in science and tech, so we can outinnovate, outproduce, and outcompete the world in the industries of the future, some of which we know and some of which we don't even know, but we know that scientific investment will produce them. And if we are at the forefront of this, we will have America continue to be the leader in these new technologies yet unimagined.

Around the globe, authoritarian governments smell blood in the water. They believe that squabbling democracies like ours can't come together and invest in national priorities the way a top-down, centralized, and authoritarian government can. They are rooting for us to fail so they can grab the mantle of global economic leadership and own innovations that will define the next century. We cannot--we cannot--we must not let that happen. I do not believe we will let it happen.

The bipartisan--the strongly bipartisan--work on this competition bill has revealed that in this Chamber we still believe--Democrats and Republicans alike, united and moving forward--that another American century lies on the horizon.

Let's move forward. Let's finish our work and pass the U.S. Innovation and Competition Act as soon as possible, certainly before the end of the month this week.

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