shooting, we were practicing on the republican side and the democrats were practicing too, and my colleague and friend and sometimes archrival in baseball, unfortunately the star of the game too many times cedric richmond somehow figured out which hospital i was sent to, and got there, probably the first person there on the scene in his baseball uniform to check on me. so many others of you, both republican and democrat reached out to ways i cannot express the attitude and how much it means to me, jennifer, and our whole family. it really does show the warm side of congress that very few people get to see. announcer: c-span, powered by cable. announcer: u.s., secretary gina raimondo testified on the president's 2020 five budget request before house appropriations subcommittee. she also answered questions on artificial intelligence

regulation, competition with china, and the inclusion of noncitizens on the u.s. census. this is just under two hours. >> the committee will be in order. without objection the chair is authorized to declare recess at any time. i want to welcome everyone to this morning's hearing. our subcommittee members are here, and secretary raimondo, thank you for being here with us as well. the department of commerce's fiscal 2025 budget request totals $11.4 billion, which is a 6% increase over the fiscal year

2024 enacted level. this includes initiatives related to bolstering trade enforcement, innovations in manufacturing technology, economic development, and many others, all initiatives that are vital to american prosperity. i am pleased to see increases requested forward force development initiatives and strengthening supply-chain security. the department of commerce's mission to spur economic growth and opportunities for all americans grows more and more important every day. we are facing foreign economic influences and challenges that can only be vaunted by

prioritizing domestic competition and american labor. from outbound investment strategies to improving industrial standards, the department of congress -- commerce is on the front line in our fight to combat china economically. through hearings like this one and a close examination of the budget priorities that you submitted, i along with my colleagues will ensure the department of commerce uses all of the tools and resources to take o nchina directly. beyond international matters of the commerce department plays a significant role in economic expansion and prosperity within our nation's borders. my district is in the heart of appalachia in southeastern kentucky. i have witness of the distress

caused by the downturn of the coal mining industry. i have seen firsthand the great things that can happen when we empower small and rural communities through job creation and economic opportunity. the economic development administration and its assistance programs encourage innovation by providing competitive incentives for job creation in struggling communities. this year's budget also proposes newer programs such as the auto program and regional technology and innovation hub program. both programs aim to create sustainable innovations to train the next generation workforce. it is no secret the american

economy was and continues to be built on ingenuity, taking smart and calculated risks. the federal government, and particularly the department of commerce, should not stand in the way of hard-working americans. i look forward to hearing about how this year's budget request prioritizes american innovation and competitiveness. so let me know recognize the ranking the of the subcommittee, mr. carlisle. >> thank you, mr. chairman, and good morning to you, and good morning to a witness. welcome, honorable gina raimondo , sec. of commerce. i do not think it is an exaggeration to say the department of commerce right now is more central to our national interested than ever.

it is responsible for a broader than ever set of priorities. your department is at the forefront of critical efforts, driving american competitiveness, american national security, american technological leadership. you are responsible for an awful lot, overseeing billions of dollars to help expand access to broadband, maintaining export controls to protect our national security, identifying weaknesses in our supply chains, providing accurate and reliable weather forecasting, bringing good jobs to distress communities. the chairman just mentioned the re-compete program, and i am interested in that. conducting an accurate census, advancing the trade interests of american businesses, and leading

the way on safety and development for critical and emerging technologies like artificial intelligence, and that is just a sample of your highest profile work. i look forward to hearing today about the department's commitment to keep american manufacturing, our supply chains and overall global competitiveness strong. the president's fiscal year 2025 budget request of $11.4 billion represents an increase of 5.9% for the apartment -- department's important and diverse missions, all of which are critical for the success of american workers and businesses in the 21st century. the request focuses on many of the department's needs, and it was interesting to read that census request as the bureau prepares for the 2030 census.

the department continues to implement key components of the bipartisan chips and sciences act and the infrastructure investment and jobs act. programs under these acts will expand broadband access across the country and revitalize america's competitive edge and semi research, development, and manufacturing. so i look forward to hearing further about these issues and others, and i thank you, adam secretary, for your ongoing work in for your presence and testimony today. i yield back. >> we will now recognize our witness, secretary raimondo, or an opening statement. without objection a written statement will be entered into the record. welcome to the subcommittee. sec. raimondo: thank you, good morning to all of you. special thank you to joe rogers, ranking member cartwright. thank you for this opportunity

this morning to discuss the president's budget, and i want to say thank you for your strong support of the department in a bipartisan way. we have received excellent support from your committee, and i want to say thank you for that. as you have said the commerce department is implementing major initiatives authorized by congress through the infrastructure investment and jobs act, the inflation protection act, the chips and sciences act. thanks to you and these laws and the funding you have provided, every day at the commerce department we are tackling the nation's most pressing economic and national security priorities. it is not an exaggeration to say the commerce department is doing more now than we ever have before. the budget request is a website is for $11.4 billion in discretionary funding and $4 billion in mandatory funding for

fiscal 2025, and i am here to discuss the budget and ask for your support. permit me to highlight just a few of our key priorities. at first the budget positions america to prevent china and other countries from obtaining u.s. technologies, capital, and expertise for activities that threaten our national security. specifically it includes a #22 -- $223 million to expand export control enforcement and $5 million to address risks from outbound investments into sensitive technologies in china. second, the budget promotes america's technological leadership and responsible innovation in artificial intelligence. we all know ai is the defining technology of our generation, so we are asking for $30 million for the ai safety institute, and

also money for ntia to establish an ai and emerging technologies led. with ai we need to invest and go fast and at the same time keep a lid on the wrist. the budget supports a resilient supply chains, it includes an increase of $12 million in ita to support a supply-chain resiliency office, and it includes $37 million for manufacturing usa program and $175 million for the manufacturing extension partnership. we cannot be a great country unless we manufacture in america and have resilient supply chains, so that is what these investments are for. the budget provides resources to strengthen our relationship with our allies, to advance our shared values, and shape the

strategic environment in which china operates. we have to out compete china. that means we have to show up around the world, so the budget includes $379 million for ita to expand u.s. exports and services to help u.s. businesses grow in foreign markets. the budget investing good jobs and equitable growth, as the chairman reference. it request $4 billion in mandatory funding for tech hubs and discretionary funding in eda in order to advance the mission of tech hubs, job training with the good jobs challenge, and foster geographic diversity and innovation. it also interests $80 million to continue our services were socially and economically disadvantaged businesses. the budget it invests to address

climate change. it includes $6.5 billion for noa a including $2 billion for weather and climate satellites, 1.4 billion dollars for the national weather service, $212 billion for climate research. finally it invests in our fundamental science infrastructure. the budget invests over $400 mil lion in fundamental research infrastructure. science research at nist, noaa, and ntia. this includes renovations and improvements at our campuses. so in closing i went to echo what the chairman said in the ranking member said. our work at the commerce department focuses on strengthening america's competitiveness both at home and abroad so that american workers,

families, and businesses can participate at a processor in 21st century global economy, and most important protect our national security. so with that i am happy to answer any of your questions. >> well, thank you, madam secretary. we will now proceed under the five minute rule for questions. i will begin by recognizing myself. madam secretary, between each census, the u.s. population grows and changes. therefore effective and efficient government requires high quality and objective sources of information. how does that cenuss -- census

bureau determine what questions will be included in the census. sec. raimondo: thank you for the question, and we are gearing up for 2030. which is closer than you might think. i am so proud to say that we have unbelievably high quality data scientists, statisticians, economists at the census, and they are constantly in the process of using the best data science and statistics techniques to figure out how do you ask these questions to get the best information. fundamentally the census should have nothing to do with politics. issue to be about getting the data so that we have the best objective picture possible of all of the people who are in america, and every information we can gather about them and their needs. >> illegal immigration is out of control.

there is a crisis at our southern border, and just like you need to be an american citizen to vote, i think you be an american citizen to be counted in the census. just like voting, census data as a direct impact on our representation. if a locality knows they can receive greater representation in congress and greater resources from the federal government, does the current policy encourage that locality to flout illegal immigration laws to inflate its own census numbers? with the secretary like to comment? sec. raimondo: respectfully, sir, i do not agree with that. the constitution is crystal clear. our job is to count all persons,

without regard to their immigration status. and as you said before, i am very proud of the professionals who work at the census, and honestly my job is not to inject my political views of the president's political views or anyone's political views into the weighted do their job -- into the way they do their job. their job is to be nonpartisan and count every person. >> given china's increasing dominance in various industries, including technology, i would hope international trade administration is working towards a plan to prioritize national security concerns alongside efforts to promote u.s. exports and reduce of the trade deficit with china.

what a measures is ita taking to repe -- prevent the transfer of sensitive u.s. technology to china? sec. raimondo: thank you for the question. this is probably the thing i spend most of my time on, which is making sure we do everything we can to deny china are most sophisticated technology. bis working with ita, we try to have a robust program. i am very proud to say that in my tenure we have put more chinese companies on the entity list then under any other commerce secretary. last year we had more convictions of export control violations than ever before, and we are just constantly -- i wake up every single day figuring out how we might tighten our controls to make sure that china

cannot get access to our most sophisticated chips, ai, quantum, etc. the budget request additional funding for bis. it has been flat for two years, licensing requests are going like this, that the rent is going like this. the budget also request money for ita so we can do outbound investment screening, make sure that u.s. money does not go to advanced chinese capability in these sensitive areas. i am out of time. i believe it at that, but i share the priority. >> how will ita ensure that u.s. businesses are not inadvertently supporting china's military ambitions or engaging in activities that could pose a threat to u.s. national security? what steps is ita taking to strengthen its screening processes and ensure compliance

with export controls? >> so as i said, we are constantly -- the thing here that we watch out for mostly is dual use, technology that can be used in commercial application but also in the military, so that is the hard work of what we do. trying to figure out what our commercially available to elegies by u.s. companies that china does not have but they want access to to advance their military? and so it is a constant vigilance, like constantly interfacing with u.s. companies, personally gathering data, and importantly in enforcing. under my leadership we have imposed the largest single civil penalty ever for company who went around our export controls. we have added more convictions

last year than any year before, so it is a combination of changing the policy, working with companies, but also being serious about enforcement. >> mr. cartwright? >> thank you, mr. chairman. secretary raimondo, you finish your opening statement rightly pointing out that our top priority in the commerce department is national security, and i agree with that. so i want to follow up on some questions the chairman had about dis, and the interconnected and rapidly modernizing world. our biggest challenges are often problems of economics and technology, two areas where the department of commerce leads. you have been using the three letters bis a lot, and a lot of people are not familiar with that. bis stands for bureau of

industry and security, and i think we ought to say that will title for people who do not know what that is. this year the request includes a $32 million increase and a request for 26 new positions. i would like you to discuss out the bureau of industry and security request helps address security challenges, especially the threat posed by china's military modernization. sec. raimondo: bureau of industry and security was not very well known until the last handful of years, and the reason is what the chairman said to come up from china. when you think national security, you might think guns, tanks, fighter jets. i think semiconductors, ai, quantum, etc. what we are doing at the commerce department is constantly studying dual use

technologies to figure out what do we have, where is china? and make certain china cannot access our technology for their military. for example, in the budget request, there is $8 million for export control officers. if we are going to go after the bad guys, we need to be on the ground collect data to find them when they do will run around our export controls. we are asking for $3.5 million for i.t. systems. we need to know where they are at all times. by the way, it is not just china. we find chinese and iranian equipment in drones in russia. that bureau of industry and security is that the leading edge of protecting this country's national security. the budget has been flat, the

threat is quadrupling and i am requesting additional money. >> your request is noted. madam secretary, as this will -- scope and complexity of the agency's work expands, do you worry about being able to hire and retain staff with the necessary technical expertise, and what is being done to address this challenge? sec. raimondo: that is such a great question. i worry about it constantly. if we are going to compete, the u.s. government needs of the top tech talent that there is, and it is why, for example, i am wasting money for the artificial intelligence safety institute. if we are going to know what is going on at the cutting edge of ai, i need the best science is that there are. so, yes, i worry about it. that being said, i am proud of

our track record. we just recruited someone from openai to coming to work for us. the chips seem is run by some of the best semiconductor professionals in the industry, so it is a daily challenge. it is why we are requesting funding, but i would say i have been very impressed with the quality of people we have been able to get. >> speaking of ai, what specific investments are you proposing? sec. raimondo: in ai, we are asking for funds for the ai safety institute, which is to create standards for ai. everyone including myself is worried about synthetic content, so we want companies to watermark ai content. what is adequate watermarking? we will build the team to develop standards so that

americans can know, be safe. we are also investing in scientists and policy people at ntia to help us develop policies for ai. in this respect i am very much looking forward to working with congress. we are doing what we can do, but at the end of the day congress needs to legislate as it relates to ai, and i look forward to supporting that effort. >> last question, the ai safety institute will be part of nist. is that correct? sec. raimondo: yes. we have two nobel prize-winning scientists. people do not understand how top-notch are the scientists at nist. >> thank you. i yield back. >> mr. gonzales? >> iran hates the united states

and our allies like israel and ukraine, and iran is eating america's lunch. department of congress -- commerce plays a key role -- i am concerned about reports of a reading in drones were determined to have been built with american-made technology to attack america to personnel and our allies. what is the commerce department doing to address illicit exports to iran? sec. raimondo: i share your concern and if you have any ideas about what more we should be doing, i would like to hear them. when the war broke out we immediately put export controls in place with russia with 39 other countries, and they were effective. they are effective. russia could not get our stuff, so they went to iran and china and now you are seeing what we are seeing.

we are constantly adding entities to our list. with respect to iran, we put together a task force with the doj and dhs to do everything that we can to enforce our export controls. i will be the first to admit that there is more work to be done for -- done. what i would tell you is every two we have we are throwing at the problem, tightening actual policy controls. some of the money i am asking for is for export control agents. we have to enforce these rules and stay vigilant. >> i have some ideas. i would love to visit with you and walk through making some of this come to fruition, and that we can follow up with that. my next question is i continue hearing concerns from rural communities. my district is larger than the state of pennsylvania, and a large part of it is in rural communities, adipose and south and west texas talk about their

potential ability, the communication providers in these areas talk about their potential ability to participate in the agency's initiative, the lack of it due to the large size of the area and that some states will require applicants to serve as well as the challenges delivering services at a very low mandated rate to certain consumers. what has the agency done about these concerns? large areas you are trying to cover? sec. raimondo: once again, you guys are hidden all of the topics they keep me up at night. my job in implementing this $42 billion is to make sure every american has access. we are massively focused on rural. that is what the subsidy is for, so we are working very closely with your governor and the governor's team using our map to figure out who is not covered in providing subsidies to companies

so that they in fact cover everyone, including in rural areas. listen, i do feel confident based on everything that i know that we will get every community, even the most rural. we are going to have to be agnostic. it may be fiber, but it may not be. that may not be affordable, and we will make sure that everyone has access that is affordable at the end of our implementation. the way that it works is every state as to submit a plan. texas is different from pennsylvania, different from kentucky, and before we are giving money to your state we have to be satisfied that everyone will be able to have access.

sec. raimondo: let me get you in more detail the answer, because as a former governor backlogs drive me crazy. i have got to give you the specifics, but i promise i will get back to you. >> i appreciate the time, and,

chairman, i yield back. >> mr. laurel is recognize. >> if i might ask unanimous consent to put opening statement in the record. i want to welcome secretary raimondo, and i do want to say and just a moment before i get to questions, i am so delighted to have you here today, and when the biden administration took over three years ago this nation really was in an economic crisis in public health catastrophe. your leadership and with the help of this committee, we have improved our supply chains, it invest in our community, and helped small businesses grow and through the appropriations process and legislative efforts like chips, the chips and signs act, infrastructure really have been -- an infrastructure that

allows us to be able to do what you said at the outset is to be competitive and make america competitive. let me just -- i think you know what question i am going to start with. my hope is that we will have a second round, but by the -- but that is outbound investment. the review section is critically important to the nation's security, and american investments are not advancing at the military, and as you just pointed out, psychological capabilities on our adversaries. when he spoke at the hearing last year you discussed the importance of targeting this policy to investments that directly impact on national security. the administrative since then issued an executive order, creating a program, riveting certain u.s. investments in countries of concern involving sensitive tech elegies and products.

it will also require notification of foreign investments involving lower risk products. while i understand treasury is leading the effort, i understand international trade administration will provide key support to analysis and industry specific technical expertise. this will be critical to understanding the security risks associated with rep. degette: events and edge technology. the budget requests an increase of $5 million and 12 positions within ita to create the new office, hire experts with the needed technical expertise. as treasury continues to work on regulations, can you describe to what extent ita has already started supporting implementation of the outbound investment executive order this year? sec. raimondo: yes, thank you. >> you have staff to dedicate to this? sec. raimondo: yes, we do.

it relates to what we are talking about. technology is one thing, but we cannot let them have our money and know-how. we have decided to focus on semiconductors and quantum midday on to make sure that u.s. money is not funding those initiatives in china. like you said, treasury is in the lead. by the end of this calendar year, the rule will be done, and so we could really start to implement it. what we are doing now in the meantime is building a team, and we have asked for 5 million to continue to study the industry, so treasury is obviously in charge of the finances and which funds and how to do the rule, but we are helping them to figure out which pieces of ai should we be most worried about? which kinds of companies should we be most worried about? when we talk about quantum, what does that mean? so we are providing the

commercial, industrial technological know-how to match up against treasury financial know-how, and we are hard at work doing that. >> beyond what is included in the budget, is there anything else you can share with us about your resource needs, how ita will ramp up activities, and given the type of technical expertise required, do you expect hiring will be a challenge? what are the phases we might be able to help with? sec. raimondo: i appreciate that. it is a few spaces. one is just data. the kinds of investments we are talking about, they are not in public stock market companies. it is private money. it is hard to track, so any data we can get access to detract these private investments by us and our allies is very important.

some of it is a buying data sets, buying i.t. systems, and the other thing is people. so we need to attract -- like we were talking about before, ai specialist, quantum specialists. not so much scientists, but commercially minded people like former venture capitalists for example, which is hard, but we have done it in the chips program. we have former investors and such. i think we could do it in ita, but that is what we are trying to do and that is the challenge. >> final point, how will ita anticipate and identify technologies and products that may be needed to add to those covered by the program now? you and i have had the conversation in the past about critical minerals, batteries, etc. what will be the process of ita

of looking at what we should add to this? >> one of the other budget requests -- and i cannot remember the precise number, but we are also asking for additional money for supply chain management office. i think it is $12 million we are asking for in ita. i will tell you all members of the committee when i started as secretary, we were using excel spreadsheets and getting on the phone with companies to do supply chain tracking, and now we are building a team. i would be happy to model the product we have built for anybody here. it is a bespoke id system or we can track and monitor our most critical supply chain vulnerabilities. we need to keep building that. we need to be much more proactive, predicting where we will have a supply chain problem? where is china poised to take advantage of us?

so that is a direction we are moving into instead of being reactive. we are out of baby formula on the shelves, react. >> thank you for the additional time. >> mr. clyde? >> thank you, chairman, and thank you, adam secretary. the bureau of industry and security enforces export controls, correct? sec. raimondo: correct. >> according to the guiding principles on his website, the bureau of industry and security should ensure the industries are promulgates does not impose unreasonable restrictions on legitimate international commercial activity. the guiding principles also state they should avoid regulatory actions that, and i quote, compromise the international competitiveness of u.s. industry. we asking for a budget increase for the bureau of industry and security and also the

international trade administration whose responsibility it is to strengthen international competitiveness of u.s. industry, providing trade and investment. you are asking for 34.5 million dollars as well, and yet the bureau of industry and security finalized its interim final rule on april 30 get the permit the current pause on firearm export licenses, highlighting previously outlined bureau guidelines by severely restricting american firearm, ammunition and other component manufacturers from acquiring the necessary licenses to export their products for sale. under this interim final rule the duration of export licenses will be reduced from four years to 1 with approvals appearing on a case-by-case basis. approximately 2000 active licenses that were previously approved will be automatically revoked, compelling the affected

companies to submit new obligations for export licenses. in fact the national shooting sports foundation estimates this could have an adverse economic impact of that event $250 mi llion for the united states firearms industry, severely hurting the manufacturers, suppliers, and jobs that are supported across the country. i request unanimous consent to submit to the record this firearm and ammunition industry economic impact report by the national sports shooting foundation. thank you. you know, this rule will cause massive confusion in the market. it will terminate current business, damage the goodwill of firearms manufacturers in illuminate future business. madam secretary, $250 million is

a huge amount. would you consider that an adverse economic impact and as compromising the competitiveness of the u.s. industry abroad? sec. raimondo: thank you for the question. i will say this. national security has to come before commerce. it is one of the hardest parts of my job. i tell semi conductor companies they cannot sell their chips to china. it denies them revenue, but first and foremost it is national security. i want to say i hear you, and i appreciate your concerns, but the reality is this is a very narrowly targeted change to tighten up our license requirements. it is based upon good data we have of our diversions. guns go one place but wind up in the hands of criminals or drug traffickers or terrorists, and we are making it hard to sell guns to 36 countries that have

undressed, huge drug cartels. it is not an america up is because national security interest to export guns that wind up in the hands of criminals that could destabilize those countries, or quite frankly our own country. i will tell you every one of those people that had licenses revoked can reapply, but it will be under stricter scrutiny in light of the evidence that we have around diversion. >> well, i mean these are fitted countries. obviously these licenses were approved in the past, ok? this is going to cause to the united states arms industry a tremendous amount of money. so was there any communication with the white house regarding this rule? sec. raimondo: probably, but, no decisions we make -- if you are

insinuating was there any political element to this, absolutely not. we have data from the gao and other places that say when law enforcement agencies confiscate guns and 36 countries in connection with crime, drug cartels, terrorist, they are guns that were diverted. they were sold to a legitimate commercial user and diverted, and that is against american national security, and that is why we took the steps. as proof that these are nearly targeted, as everything we do, the restrictions will affect less than 10% of all gun exports , so i don't agree with you. i agree, i admit, it is some commerce, that i think national security comes first and i do not agree these are large swaths of national commerce. >> a $250 million economic impact is not narrowly tailored. i certainly cannot support this

increase in funding when bis comes out with this particular type of rule, and i yield back. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman, and a ranking member cartwright for holding this important hearing, and thank you for joining us today and thank you for your service and that of your staff. the whole operation has been incredibly professional and helpful. i want to talk briefly about regional tech hubs. appreciate your leadership in this space, which has been extraordinary. if you can just help articulate -- my hope is that we will find ways to have robust, consistent and predictable funding for the regional tech a program over the next decade. it seems to me that is important not only to aid those areas we will invest in, but also to attract private capital.

i wonder if you can talk about from the perspective of both achieving the nation and attracting private capital to many of these communities why that robust inconsistent funding is important for predictability? sec. raimondo: i cannot believe i have gone this far in a hearing without somebody asking about tech hubs, and here is why . in my entire time in government, i have never seen a more popular program on a bipartisan basis in rural communities, and it is unbelievable to me. it is a great program that you created and authorized. we have 400 applications. we are asking for about $2 bill ion. we will have the money to make half a dozen tech hub it investments of size $40 million. of the 400, we identified 31

that we thought were really the best. every single one of those is worthy of funding, but due to funding constraints in eda, we will do 6 to 10-ish it investments. this is necessary for national security. i can do everything possible to deny china. the way we will be china is by out innovating china, and that means tapping into the technology, resources, and talent in every nook and cranny in america, including in coal country and world country. kentucky has a great tech hub proposal. in all of your districts, your states and put in great tech hub programs. silicon valley, boston, york city do not have a monopoly on

great talent, great ideas, and great to elegy, and the whole point of tech hubs is to get outside of those communities and consistently fund innovation in america to make a stronger two out compete the world. the budget asks for additional funding for that. i respectfully request that additional funding. it will make america stronger in every way possible. >> i appreciate that. i am not sure if i get points for being the first person to ask. i want to turn quickly to ai. i actually have introduced legislation which would prohibit the disclosure of nonconsensual ai deep fake in pornography, which as it turns out 96% deep fakes online are pornographic or intimate in nature, but what i really appreciate about the ai safety institute is i believe

part of this is to look at content authenticity detection, which is really important, so people get to be certain or have some degree of confidence that what they are looking at actually is real and has not been adapted or faked in some way. can you talk about you in a vision nist doing to identify that? sec. raimondo: thank you for your legislation. it is really scary and unbelievable to see some of these deep fakes. so what we are going to do in the budget request for nist is a couple of things. one, develop the signs to be able to identify what is authentic versus what is ai generated, but two, i think we need to get to a place, and we will need congress' it to do

this, where we require companies to identify is this ai generated content or real content? and they will do that by some process of watermarking, and what we will have to do is figure out what is adequate watermarking. it is all about trust. ai is exciting, it can cure cancer faster and create medicine, but people have to trust it, so we will develop standards around synthetic content and watermarking, so an individual when they see it will know is it fake or real? and if it is watermarked fake or real, they can trust and that watermark. >> i appreciate that, and i know my time is up, but we also need to think about the data sets used to train ai models. i do not think there was enough conversation around that and i would love to interact with your staff.

thank you. i yield back. >> thank you, madam secretary for being here today. i would like to first give you a compliment on the bureau of industry and security restricting the sale of chips f rom intel and qualcomm to hua wei. the turnaround on that was fantastic. as well as using ntia for grants to offset what huawei has done. they are a real threat and we are realizing that. i want to transition to taiwan in the south china sea. can you describe for me exactly approximately how much of the world's commerce goes through the south china sea? sec. raimondo: massive amounts. technically, i am not allowed to talk about any particular license revocation.

however, back to our conversation, huawei is a threat, ai is our focus. as we get more data around our threats, we make changes to tighten the screws, including revoking licenses that had been previously given. so without commenting on two companies specifically, i want to ensure you we are constantly on it, including revoking licenses. i don't have a number for you, but massive -- >> it is about 1/3. and that is in the vicinity of taiwan, so can you briefly describe what happens if china innovates taiwan and locks down the south china sea to american commerce? sec. raimondo: it would be absolutely devastating. >> how devastating? sec. raimondo: right now, i am not commenting on whether that

will happen, and how it will happen and if it will happen, but right now the united states buys 92% of its leading edge chips from tsmc. >> that is because they are two generations ahead of anything we can build in the united states, correct? sec. raimondo: there are vastly ahead of anything we are doing in the united states. the announcement tsmc just made in arizona will be to build two nanometer and three nanometer stuff. >> it makes it essential for us to defend the south china sea and taiwan, not just one place. would you agree? sec. raimondo: i would agree. >> on the chips issue, we are finding chips from north korean drones being used by russia to attack ukraine have american ships in them, so what is bis doing to stop that flow?

it appears they can use what we think are harmless commercial grade chips to use for legal purposes around the world at a time that very much looks like 1940. can we be doing more or are you doing all of you can and some just slip through? what do you think? sec. raimondo: a few things. the fact that they have to use chips from breast pumps and refrigerators, which is what they are doing, is because our initial controls worked. we are denying this sophisticated stuff, which has slowed them down usually, which is what they are doing. they're having to rely on iran and china to do this. that is not good news, but it is what it is. we are doing everything we know how to do his fastest weekend with the resources we have. for example, when we find out a

chinese company is going around our expert controls to russia, we put that company on the entity list. when we find out, we create a task force with the hsn doj to help us identify and prosecute countries or companies that go around our export controls. listen, if you have ideas of more you think we can do, i want to hear them. i think we are doing everything we with the resources that we have. it is massively frustrating and anchoring when you see russia do what they do and work with folks like china to get around our export controls. >> i know you are doing the best you can do, especially in the national security realm. i yield back. host: -- >> mr. roethlisberger. >> i think you are doing a great

job. keep doing it. you have areas you are involved in, and you are coming together as a team to make a difference. i also want to thank you for designating baltimore as a tech hub. we are excited to go after the funds, a total of $200 billion over the next five years. the president and ceo of maryland medical system is well, the chair of the baltimore board of directors at the application reflected the collective belief in the productive potential of health technologies to revolutionize our industries and elevate entire communities. i have spent close to 21 years in congress advocating for national security. when i was in leadership on the intelligence community the chairman and i were to keep huawei out of the united states systems. we knew huawei was a backdoor

threat that could cripple the u.s. if we put them in an adversarial system and it almost happened when the governor of texas brought them into united states. for a long time, we knew china stole from us. there were taking everything from fertilizer recipes to advanced technology. threats of the come from the ceiling of u.s. technology is great read look at china's space program. they made the best of advances by stealing from us. the technological races of today like space, quantum computers, artificial intelligence, we have to do everything we can to protect these technologies. we have to protect them from our adversaries, and the department of commerce is on the front line of that. and you 60 minutes interview, a lot of the issues you talked about were alarming and spot on. in our efforts to address

competition and threats from china, we need to make sure the department of commerce has the tools, resources like art other frontline defender in the department of defense. we can always give you money and manpower, but what technology tools do you need to work smarter like supply chain, mapping, etc.? how can the commerce working with the fbi, department of home and security to address law enforcement issues? and secondly, what are we talking about here is a balance between enforcement in helping the economy. what we have here is a boeing paradox. going as to sell planes to china, but what happens if we are in a situation that is more aggressive with china? talk about how you balance economic security with economic needs. did you get all of that? sec. raimondo: i am familiar

with your tech hub. >> it makes me excited. sec. raimondo: the governor is called me numerous times, so i got the memo. secondly, we do need people. some of it is just human beings to do enforcement, right? we are trying to cover the world here, so, yes, we work with the fbi, the intelligence community. we are, we have several new efforts with the doj, enforcement comes from the doj but we do need more manpower, to your point. we also need more i.t. systems. we need more data sets. the amount of information available, and also we need to use ai, so we need to buy

products that are ai enabled that allow us to scour every dataset all over the world and every piece of data, public and private, to tell us what is really going on. that's what we need. here is the one thing i would say to you. you mentioned boeing. we aren't trying to cut off all trade with china. we aren't trying to cut off, we will try to sell to them and that is good for america's economy, semiconductor chips and technology. the reason is because they make a lot themselves, they can buy a lot from the rest of the world. we need to focus on these choque point technologies -- choke point technologies that we have and they can't get access to, not commodity-type goods. it makes it, it is more doable if you can identify, what are

the choque points and focus on that and work with our allies, work with the japanese and the dutch for example on semiconductors to completely deny china, to slow their military down. that is important. we need to focus on military capability. i will tell you, we have controlled almost 700 types of dual use items to russia, to the questions before, and we are constantly adding, i think we have added almost 100 chinese entities to the entity list because they are trying to aid and abet russia going around our export controls. so this is hand-to-hand combat every day. we have to go at it every day and the resources i'm asking for will help us do a better job. >> i yield back.

rep. cline: good morning. i want to talk about, federal contractors taking ownership of patents on inventions created with federal funding. the government has the power to grant compulsory licenses to third parties. december 8 of last year, a draft framework was issued to provide guidance to federal agencies on what to assess, considering whether he -- two authorize authority. it was passed in 1980. the office states the law makes no mention of reasonable price that should be -- are you concerned the administration's proposal to consider price is a factor for exercising marching rights will send us back to a time when government research sat on the shelf? sec. raimondo: we stand on the

side of ip protection. and the document to which you are referring is nonbinding. it is interagency memo for guidance. which is just that. all of this is a balancing test. the president has rightly focused excessively -- extremely on bringing down the cost of pharmaceuticals and bringing down the cost of medicine and drugs successfully. but i don't want you -- i don't want to give you any impression we stand strongly on the side of i.p. protection. mr. cline: thank you. let me stay with i.p. over the past decade standards essential patents, s.p.e.'s have become a focal point of controversy. the european courts, germany, frequently issue injunctions against u.s. companies for common industry standards such as wi-fi which do not align factors in the united states. -- with practices in the united states. these injunctions don't address

competitive harms but compel companies to agree to excessively high royalty fees. the recent establishment of the unified patent court in europe poses an increased risk as its injunction also have broader implications across multiple countries in europe. given the significant impact of this on u.s. businesses, can you explain the administration's stance on the proposed regulation concerning essential patents and how it plans to stand up for u.s. companies in the face of challenges posed by entities like huawei and others. who engage in aggressive patent monetization? secretary raimondo: what i can tell you is we just had kathy, who runs the patent office, in china, focused on many of these issues. she was recently in europe. i have to get back to you with a proper answer. i will do it and maybe you and kathy and i can have a phone call and go into the details. mr. cline: that would be great. as the president's principal advisor on spectrum issues, ntia plays a role in continuing the -- ensuring the technologies of the future continue to advance

u.s. telecommunications industries, employing 5-g technologies, with the danger of falling behind china, do you agree the united states must restore the s.e.c.'s auction authority and identify and -- a pipeline on spectrum that can support commercial innovation and u.s. leadership? secretary raimondo: i do. here's what i think. i think certainly we need to restore their auction authority. i think this is a balance which is to say we support an ntaa studying the spectrum, seeing what could be made available. and looking at maybe spectrum sharing. we can't -- d.o.d. needs what it needs to do its mission. a lot of the spectrum is really important. i strongly support figuring out how we can find some spectrum to advance commercial innovation without ever impairing their mission. i think it's possible. by the way, here's what i also think. we can't think of national security so narrowly.

i said this before. national security isn't just tanks, missiles, satellites, etc. it's also our ability to out compete huawei, our ability to out compete china. if you look at the amount of mid band spectrum available in china versus here for commercial sector, we got a lot of catching up to do. i think it's complicated and i don't want my comments to be interpreted as saying go take from the d.o.d. whatever we need. but i do think it's a discussion we have to have. and we absolutely need their auction authority re-authorized. mr. cline: thank you. one more. and tia has approved four states plans so far. you testified repeatedly, that the underlying statute prohibits them from regulating broadband rates and you are not regulating price setting. i'm hearing approval by virginia has been held up because it declined to do that. such prices at and tia request.

it has been five months since the louisiana plan which was submitted at the same time as virginia's. and virginia still has not been approved. there are no remaining outstanding issues i understand with virginia's plan under the rightful acknowledgement that neither ntiaa nor the state has the authority to set prices that they are requesting. can you commit to approving a state plan that complies with the law and approving virginia's plan? secretary raimondo: i cannot commit to the last one. i'll commit to the first one. let me say this. these are super complicated. there will be more next week and more the following week. we are getting our fly wheel going. i will look in on virginia when i go back this afternoon. what i can promise you we aren't rate regulating. we are not telling any state, including yours, if you don't provide it at x dollars we are not going to give you the money. the statute requires us to have low-cost options.

we are obviously pushing states to make sure they are providing low-cost options. i will tell everyone here that by the end of this year, by the fall, i'm pushing the team to have all these plans approved. i meet with them every week to say where are you and how to go faster, and i'll look in on your plan. mr. cline: thank you. yield back. chair rogers: ms. meng. ms. meng: thank you, mr. chairman. thank you, secretary raimondo, for your tremendous work and for being here today. i wanted to go back to the citizenship question that was mentioned earlier. as you know well and you alluded to, the 14th amendment of the u.s. constitution states that representatives shall be apportioned among the several states according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each state. i know that you and the public servants who lead the census bureau take this mandate from the constitution seriously. is there any agency in the

federal government that keeps track of noncitizens? secretary raimondo: you have stumped me. ms. meng: i assume -- secretary raimondo: not certainly in my permit -- remit, no. ms. meng: why is the practice of counting every person living in each state needed to produce an accurate and full census? secretary raimondo: because as you well know, and every governor knows, i know this from being governor, the census is just about getting information. how much housing is required in a particular state. how much -- how many people are going to be in the schools. that's why i bristle at any political interference frankly from either side as it relates to the census. it's like just the facts, ma'am. we have experts collect, as you say, follow the constitution, every person.

undercounting, undercounting is a problem because it's an inaccurate picture of what's going on in every state and what kind of safety services are needed. what kind of educational services are needed. if people are afraid, if people are afraid because of their immigration status to talk to the census counter, we are not going to get an accurate number, and that inaccuracy prevents us from doing the best job we can at running government at the state level and federal level. ms. meng: if we were to violate what the constitution has charged the census bureau to do, would that potentially affect the amount of federal funding that a state could receive? secretary raimondo: absolutely, yes. ms. meng: thank you. i wanted to also thank you for your department's recent action on regulating licenses for firearms experts.

i know that my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are extremely concerned as we are about the threats posed by transnational criminal networks and adversarial governments. i must say that i'm confused by their opposition to their proposed change. i want to ask if this rule will keep american guns out of the hands of drug traffickers? secretary raimondo: we hope it will. that's its intention. that's how we are going to enforce it. i'll say i was recently in costa rica, a region of great instability. the president there was they're a democracy, they are trying to develop their economy. that's good for the united states to have an ally with a thriving democracy in that region. contrast that with ecuador. we are doing this, not for political reasons, but for our own foreign policy. it's not in our interests for drug traffickers, terrorists,

murderers, people interested in fomenting instability and destroying democracy to have guns. ms. meng: will this rule decrease the number of american guns in the hands of foreign terrorists and transnational criminal organizations? secretary raimondo: yes. we believe that it will. ms. meng: will this rule make our world and our country safer? secretary raimondo: yes. we believe it will. ms. meng: finally, how will the funding that the department of commerce has requested for fiscal year 2025 enable the bureau of industry and security to continue its work of protecting our national security, especially as it relates to gun violence? secretary raimondo: we are asking for additional funds for more analysts, more technologists, more data sets, more technology, and more enforcement agents.

we can have the best policy in the world, but if we don't have enough people to enforce it, we are not going to be effective. ms. meng: thank you. i yield back. chair rogers: mr. garcia. mr. garcia: thank you, mr. chairman. on the census conversation i agree everyone should be counted for the purposes of infrastructure and public safety. but not for the purposes of representation either at the state level assemblies or in the house of representatives. which is currently, it does wag the dog in terms of representation. that's the point what we are trying to do. madam secretary, you and i share the aspirations of reciprocal trade agreements with china. i agree we can't cut off all trade with china, but imparting on them the same terms and conditions of contracts and share ratios, access to intellectual property that they put on us when we do business in

their country i think is important when they do business in our country. we'd love to keep those conversations going offline if we can and figure out how we can help in you that regard. that's a broader conversation. the former program director and me can't help but look at chips act as a very massive program that should have program management reviews on a regular basis. this is probably one of the forums we get to do that. i'm going to ask you questions. there are some indexes, s.p.i. and c.p.i. schedule performance index, cost performance index. the original budget of chips was roughly $280 billion. now we are approaching about the two-year anniversary of the passage of chips. we didn't really have an objective end state goal in terms of dates, but we all kind of understand that 2027 is an important calendar line in the sand relative to the highest risk potential of china invading taiwan.

with those numbers and that paradigm, how are we doing from a program management perspective? are you on schedule? are you on cost? and before you answer i want to overlay the feedback that i'm getting from folks in silicon valley, also smaller mom and pop shops in southern california and throughout the country. they don't feel like we are going fast enough. they feel like they are being overregulated. they feel like we are overlying other requirements and specs that have nothing to do with the technology. that have nothing to do with the performance or construction of facilities. there are actual d.e.i. metrics being imparted on these contracts and tracked as conditions of awards. nepa issues and environmental quality issues that continue to just get worse and deeper. there are some companies having

to retroactively go back and show compliance to davis-bacon labor policies they would not have otherwise had to do with construction that would not have been done by outside union labor organizations. you are pushing a lot of smaller companies away with these regulatory requirements from participating. this is exactly what we were afraid of happening. and you and i, i appreciate all the time you spent in the scif with me, explaining the nexus to the dod and making sure we satisfied the requirements. i'd like to take that conversation offline and follow up. talk about the health of the program in terms of metrics. are we on schedule, on cost? how do we go faster? these barriers to speed are real. how can the contracting officers' value speed as much as they value other things maybe such as d.e.i. or some of these labor policy requirements being enforced?

if you can comment on that. secretary raimondo: thank you. first on reciprocal trade. one of the things we did recently was through b.i.s. was around connected vehicles. you can't drive your tesla to the airport in beijing. you can't. you can't drive an american made connected vehicle around certain areas in china. so what's fair is fair. what we are saying is we are concerned about chinese connected vehicles on the roads in the united states not for tariffs and such, economic disparities, but data. think of all the data. mr. garcia: electric buses driven around plant 42 driven by -- that are made by a chinese company would be a problem, which is what we have in our district. secretary raimondo: collecting data on the driver, what they say, where they go, their driving patterns. just a second to let you know i am trying to move out on some of these reciprocity ideas we have

been discussing to protect americans. mr. garcia: thank you. secretary raimondo: on chips, here's what i'll say i'll try in 30 seconds. i think we are on path. that's the bottom line. you say we are approaching the two-year anniversary. i have six months before the two-year anniversary. that's a lot of wood to chop between now and then. we have put out -- i started with nothing. i now have 200 people. amazingly talented people. we would welcome you to come meet them any time. we have put out i think $29 billion. we have been on a roll recently. i know people were frustrated until the beginning of this year. the last three months we have done i think seven or eight big deals putting out nearly $30 billion. all to the leading edge providers. the conversation we had earlier, tsmc has committed to build three fabs, including nanometer

chip fabs in the united states. samsung is included. leading edge, plus research and development, plus packaging. micron would be at scale. so i think, look. i know i have to go fast. but it's much more important that i get it right. the metric i look at is will we be making 20% of the world's leading edge chips in the united states by 2030? and i say yes. i think we can. with respect to the smaller companies it's a challenge, but we are trying. we have just put out an application for smaller companies to apply. i can get you that information. get the word out to your constituents. it's harder for little companies to interact with government. we have a specific application. we are going to do another one, a $50 million research and development that only small companies can apply to. with respect to nepa, look, it's tough. i have a whole team that is

helping companies work through the nepa issues. we are getting there, but it's a challenge. davis-bacon's in the law. davis-bacon is in the statute. we will comply. we are complying. and i don't think -- every condition we are putting in there, some related to workforce, some related to childcare, some related to d.e.i., i can honestly tell you, congressman, it's designed to make sure these projects are successful. they need to find workers. if you say what's the biggest risk, it's lack of workers. we are pushing these companies to broaden the way they think about workforce, the way they train workforce so they can have the talent they need on the timeline that they need it. this is a big discussion. i'd be very happy to follow up. mr. garcia: i yield back. chair rogers: that concludes the first round of questions for the witness. there is a request for additional questions.

so we'll do a second round. i ask unanimous consent of all members that we limit remarks to three minutes. to allow the witness to meet an obligation at noon that she has. madam secretary, we will get you out of here in due course. i recognize myself for three minutes. talk about space business, spacg thousands of new small and medium-sized satellites being deployed to low-earth orbit yearly. this office has been designated as the organization for tracking and managing those assets. those small satellites. there are thousands of them.

i am told. what will the space commerce unit at the department of commerce do to count these satellites? secretary raimondo: there are so many, as you have said, so we are developing a space situational awareness and traffic coordination program. i think of it as like air traffic control for space. and we received $65 million last year to develop this. we are requesting another $75 million in this budget to continue that. it's on track. it is on track. we have an excellent person running the office of space commerce. and that's our primary focus right now is developing this tracking system. so we can have an awareness of where all of this space satellite activity is. chair rogers: space commerce has

been given the mandate to begin to track those assets existing and new ones to be sure they don't prevent the deployment of new systems. into low-earth orbit. and perhaps more importantly, that they do not inhibit civil and other space satellite deployment as well as rocket launches for various nasa missions. tell us how this is going to happen? this is a big task. secretary raimondo: it is a big task. it is a big task. i think, look. space commerce is a burgeoning industry and it's critical the u.s. leads. in the civilian space areas. commercial space. so fundamentally what we have to do is make sure the u.s. leads in that area. developing this space

situational awareness system, which we are doing and the space traffic coordination system enables us to do that by -- if you keep track of everything it reduces collisions. it reduces problems and creates safety. quite frankly it's an incentive for investors to invest in u.s. commercial space industry if we have this space trafficking system effective. chair rogers: one complicating factor is we are going to de-orbit the international space station in 2030. and many of the commercial providers now on that station will be looking for a new home in lower-earth orbit which complicates it even more. is that right or wrong? secretary raimondo: that's

right. it's a balance. we have to balance these interests. chair rogers: thank you. mr. cartwright. mr. cartwright: thank you, mr. chairman. secretary raimondo, i want to talk about the united states economic development administration which is housed in the department of commerce. e.d.a. has an important role in spurring job creation and economic diversification in communities that have suffered decline and stagnation as the industrial economy rapidly evolves. that's true in my district. you know that in northeastern pennsylvania our economy has been bumping along since the decline of coal mining, since nafta, which bestowed benefits and burdens across our nation. but unevenly. we suffered a lot of manufacturing loss in northeastern pennsylvania

because of nafta. and legislative efforts since then have not fixed that problem. e.d.a. is one of the solutions. i'd like to hear, by the way, thank you for visiting pittston. northeastern pennsylvania. you know the mayor has done amazing things to bring back that small city. and we want to do more. i'd like to hear broadly what key economic development needs are you hearing most often as you go around the country visiting places like pittston? secretary raimondo: i had fun going. i enjoyed the visit. what i hear, and it's across all of your states, it's coal affected communities, nafta affected communities, where i'm from in rhode island, the jewelry manufacturing capital of the country, all withered away. what i hear is a need for u.s.

manufacturing. there's something special about manufacturing jobs. they are high paying. they don't require a college degree. there is a job for everyone in the facility. people say why can't we make more in america? that's why it's so exciting for me when i'm out in arizona where i recently was with tsmc and intel. it's amazing. tens of thousands of manufacturing jobs are brought about by the chips act. i hear the constant need for retraining which is why i created the good jobs challenge when i became secretary. people want to work. put yourself in the shoes of a 42-year-old woman who has been a retail clerk her whole career. or a waitress and got put out of work in covid. she can't retire. she wants to work. but she needs skills. she needs digital skills or a.i. skills or something. a desperate need for retraining. a desperate need to invest in infrastructure that will attract companies.

you see that in pittston or wherever. sometimes you might have a vacant mine or manufacturing facility. they have to be resuscitated to new uses. and that takes money. e.d.a. spends money on all of that. we are investing in infrastructure, job training. the recompete program. recompete is about helping the most distressed communities. those are the ones that are the hardest and take a lot of investment, but it's worth it. mr. cartwright: i yield back. chair rogers: mr. cline. mr. cline: thank you. madam secretary, i'm concerned about the department's handling of long-standing issue over imports of vietnamese plywood into the united states. two companies with operations in my district have been assessed,

countervailing duties over imported vietnamese plywood in 2021, 2022 even though the department previously assured importers that plywood imports with a vietnamese core would not be subject to such duties. retroactive decision in 2023 has had negative impacts on u.s. companies which imported this product. in good faith. and moreover these companies independently audited proved the plywood originated in vietnam and not china which was the target. the department refuses to consider such proofs and merely relies on the failure of vietnamese exporters to satisfactorily respond to commerce questionnaires. the ultimate issue is where did the product come from? vietnam or china? this matter is currently in pending administrative review with a decision expected by july 30. i would ask you to hopefully accept and consider the independent audits to resolve this matter. if you have any response. secretary raimondo: a couple things. this is a quasi-judicial process with which i can't interfere.

the concern which we see a ton of is, it is china dumps into vietnam. vietnam into the united states. it's an end run around our anti-dumping regulations. it's appropriate for me to look at it and certainly have my staff reach out to you. we are not -- we don't want to hurt your local company. we do want to hurt china trying to get around our rules. mr. cline: completely agree. i ask for a fair evaluation of the evidence being -- secretary raimondo: i will do it. mr. cline: with regard to counterfeit chinese vapes, in the december 2023 press release announcing f.d.a. and c.b.p.'s joint seizure of illegal e-cigarettes with a retail value in excess of $18 million. the fda said many of them were intentionally misdeclared with

-- as various items like toys or shoes and listed with incorrect values. if shipping containers full of illegal e-cigarettes products from china either as to the -- miss declared as to the country of origin to avoid the china tariff for product category to avoid the vapor tariff, this would represent criminal violations of custom laws on an industrial scale. it would also amount to massive fraud on the u.s. treasury in terms of lost tariff revenues. i am assuming you are aware how big this problem is. what steps have you taken to address the problem and recover those lost revenues? secretary raimondo: it's detail. i can get back to you. that's mostly a c.b.p. issue. we work closely with c.b.p. we furnish them the data we need and cooperate with them. but this is what you are talking about is primarily their remit. mr. cline: i yield back. chair rogers: ms. delauro. ms. delauro: thank you. with regard to dumping i think

closing the loophole is something that ought to be considered as well. i think that's within the ustr. with regard to vet, and talking about countering unfair trade practices, what role does the department have in confronting china's manufacturing dominance through trade policy? working with ustr to address trade issues that have concern with allies, partners, and adversaries, how if at all is the department working with ustr? secretary raimondo: we work hand in glove with them on so many issues. i want to say i'm very concerned about this. it's no secret that china's economy is growing slower than it has and that they have wanted it to. it's also no secret that their strategy is crank up production. they now represent about 30% of

the world's manufacturing output. they could decide to go to 60% to keep chinese people working, which would be disastrous for the global economy. i worry greatly, congresswoman, about the possibility that they do that and dump their cheap products whether it's electric vehicles, legacy semiconductor chips, critical minerals. the list is long if they crank up production and dump it on the world market. we are working very closely with ustr to try to identify where are we most vulnerable and what actions could we take? one thing specifically that we have done at commerce, we just used the defense production act to do a mandatory survey about legacy semiconductor chips proud -- produced in china. we are trying to find out where are these legacy chinese chips in u.s. supply chains, and do we

see any evidence of china dropping the price? which would distort the market and make it impossible for u.s. chip companies to compete. i'm laser focused on that area in particular. ms. delauro: emerging markets as well. exporting it, manufacturing, and technical standards for emerging markets and certain technology efforts as you pointed out. information, communications, advanced manufacturing. and obviously you are aware of the challenge and take it from your comments that other departments are preparing and designing what structures you need. and again what resources you may need to be able to counter. secretary raimondo: that's exactly right. ms. delauro: the $4 million for global markets, the i.t.a. requests that. which markets do they see as strategic for this purpose? how would that be addressed? secretary raimondo: africa.

i was just in kenya. extremely important. china's all over africa. we have to show up. certain areas of southeast asia. ms. delauro: i yield back. thank you. chair rogers: mr. clyde. mr. clyde: thank you, mr. chairman. madam secretary, do you think the number of illegal aliens that were counted in the 2020 census had an impact on the apportionment of the house of representatives that we have today? secretary raimondo: i don't think so. but i don't have a great answer for you. mr. clyde: ok. can you get me a great answer? secretary raimondo: what do you think? mr. clyde: i think it did. it really did. if we are looking at over 20 million illegals in this entry, then i think it had a significant impact. secretary raimondo: my job, though, isn't -- mr. clyde: you mentioned that the census is counting the whole

number of persons in each state. i agree with you. it's what the 14th amendment says. it also says in section 2 of the 14th amendment when it talks about representatives in congress it says the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the portion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens, 21 years of age in such state. now, i know, the 19th amendment added both male and fee. -- and female. the 26th amendment lowered the age to 18. the 14th amendment still says male citizens is the basis -- excuse me citizenship is the basis of representation. i'm grateful to take a clarifying action this week to prevent the marginalizing of citizens voting by finally requiring a citizenship question on the decennial census. and by modifying the house of representatives apportionment to be based only on united states citizens. i look forward to voting for h.r. 7109, the equal representation act which i'm a

proud original co-sponsor. can you tell me a little bit about the census bureau's annual business survey? what is the cost of that annual business survey? why did it go from five-year in 2017 to one year? secretary raimondo: i could probably get you the cost. i'll have to get back to you on the exact cost. i do want to say something to your last question. the census' job is to identify persons living in this country. and i know from experience, i lived it, when you start to ask people about their immigration status, they then don't answer the door and won't be counted. it will lead to inaccurate data. mr. clyde: i appreciate that. i'm going -- moving on to the census bureau's annual business survey. my next question to you is how much money is spent on follow-up with those businesses that do not initially respond to the

census' annual business survey? do you have that? secretary raimondo: i don't. but i can get it to you. a great deal of money. we try to get everyone to respond. mr. clyde: how do you determine who you ask? secretary raimondo: you have to ask the scientists. to be clear, i don't interfere with any of this. this is statisticians figure out what's likely to lead to the best outcomes. i defer to their judgment. mr. clyde: then i can be assured that you'll get me that information. secretary raimondo: 100%. mr. clyde: thank you very much. i yield back. chair rogers: ms. meng. ms. meng: thank you, mr. chairman. i look forward to voting against the bill that is called the equal representation act but literally does the opposite. and to pretend that noncitizens do not live in our communities, that's exactly what this bill would do, pretend, will only, as you mentioned, madam secretary,

instill fear, force people into the shadows, and take critical federal funding away from every single state, red, blue, purple, rural, urban, suburban. that's not the point of the census to count like this. in 2018 the previous administration repeatedly tried and attempted to add a citizenship question to the census, which i am proud to say that senator hirono and i and others fought against in congress and subsequently was blocked by the supreme court. i wanted to ask a quick question about the minority business development agency which offers many programs and services that held businesses to grow and be competitive. i represent a diverse district in queens, new york, where many minority-owned businesses are in many ways the backbone of our community.

secretary raimondo, how does the fiscal year 2025 budget request ensure that those who most need the assistance and resources can continue to access them? secretary raimondo: thank you. we have asked for an additional $12 million in mbda to do that. our mission is to help business owners who are economically and socially disadvantaged, including asian americans, members of your district and all of your districts. we are looking to add more offices, more staff, more service offerings so we can be more available these small businesses. ms. meng: thank you. i yield back. chair rogers: mr. ellzey. mr. ellzey: thank you, mr. chairman. madam secretary, people of the sixth district, very rural district, very worried about in

many cases the debt of our nation being $34 trillion. a lot of the budget requests we have asked for -- you asked for here are increases and some new agencies particularly the supply chain resiliency, $37 million. offline, not necessarily here, please give me a justification for that and what the office of supply chain resiliency intends to actually do. once a bureaucracy grows it's very hard to dial it back whenever it's not needed. i believe in the market. i'm curious how this will help the market. so later on, please send me the answer. i want to talk about china again and the threat we are facing from four dictatorships, iran, china, north korea, and russia. the chip issue -- it seems like china is controlling all the strings. everything that they do in this country technologically is a military operation from the ccp.

and everything they do is a study on the pattern of life. everything's got a transponder in it from the big cranes in the ports to the box cars that dry -- try to dump, which we successfully stopped to the technological coming in is a pattern of life study, which is what you do whenever you are going to study how to best attack a nation. we are already in a proxy war in china with them using cartels to kill 200 americans every day as an equalizer for their one child policy which is about to send them into oblivion. can you describe for me what you think the threat is from the electronics from china in the united states. secretary raimondo: couple things, i was very pleased to see congress take action on tiktok. that's an example of tiktok being on the phones of hundreds of millions of -- tens of millions of americans. collecting all that data. that was one thing. secondly, one thing we are doing is looking into electric

vehicles, connected vehicles. chinese electric vehicles on our roads at scale. could be collecting massive amounts of data on americans. who they are, where they go to, what they say in their car, patterns of driving. we have opened an investigation at the commerce department looking at that. also very much looking at cranes. the vast majority of cranes at u.s. ports are chinese. cranes are no longer steel in the air. they are all connected collecting data. i'd say this is -- we are building the capacity of our icts unit at the commerce department and looking very seriously at all of these connected apps whether they are games, cars, or that collects -- or anything that collects data on large numbers of individuals. their g.p.s. location. where they are. where they go. their family members.

i think that we need to take the threat much more seriously. that's why we are moving on on these things. mr. ellzey: thank you very much. i yield back. chair rogers: mr. ruppersberger. [indiscernible] mr. ruppersberger: can you hear me? secretary raimondo: yes. mr. ruppersberger: it was devastating for so many maryland families and businesses, i'm sure you know especially for the port of baltimore. last week my colleagues and i saw in person a terrific effort under way to clean up and replace this bridge. but our state is still feeling many of the ripple effects after the collapse. secretary, can you describe what your department has done so far to support these maryland-based businesses? what are the department's plans for the future of this program? and how can we make sure maryland's business can make it through this rebuilding process?

the maryland port of baltimore is one of the largest ports in the nation in the entire united states relies on it. secretary raimondo: my heart's with you and all those businesses and everyone there. i have talked to your governor on numerous occasions about this. by the way, noaa, the weather service, and our scientist team were on it right away to provide help in the immediate aftermath. mr. ruppersberger: it's one of the best efforts. hopefully it will pull the united states together. republicans and democrats, the -- for the benefit of our country. secretary raimondo: yeah. i agree with that. in any event, we are reaching out, the mbda and e.d.a. are reaching out to the businesses in that community, working with governors' offices, working with the governor's economic development agency to see what services we provide to those businesses. i think -- i think it's on the books already. i'm going to do an event in baltimore with the governor,

with small businesses, i'm going to go myself. just to let them know all the services we have available for small businesses. figure out ways we can help them get back on their feet. mr. ruppersberger: it's going to cost about $2 billion to replace it. it's a very unique place. affects the port of baltimore. so thank you for your cooperation and your involvement. secretary raimondo: thank you. mr. rogers: mr. morelle. mr. morelle: thank you, mr. chairman. if i can just talk for a moment about quantum technology. i was at a group meeting with national quantum experts last week, and i wanted -- one mentioned to me in 2017 the chinese used a satellite to send entangled particles between space and the ground. since then as i understand it china has constructed 2,000 mile quantum link between beijing and

shanghai. obviously quantum technology was communications, computing, etc. is a huge leap forward in technology that we need to be at the leading edge of. is there value in building, should the united states consider a significant national link between major cities that will allow us to use quantum networking? secretary raimondo: i'm afraid i would have to research that. quantum expert i am not. so we could follow up. it is an area -- a couple things. it's definitely frontier technology which is why we are export controlling seriously. it's up on investment screening list. we have asked in the budget for $68 million which is an increase of $14 million, at nist to hire 41 people to develop new standards and create research partnerships for quantum. we are really leaning in at nist with universities to push

forward on the research. whether or not what you say -- mr. morelle: i would love to see if there is value. secretary raimondo: i don't know the people at nist will have an opinion. we should make that happen. mr. morelle: i wanted -- you mentioned earlier a real problem around the chips space which is workforce development. talk to me a little bit about what the department's strategy is to promote workforce development in the space so that we can meet the needs of these businesses that are struggling? secretary raimondo: this is such a huge issue. i was yesterday with the c.e.o. of one of the biggest construction firms in america. he said that they -- attrition rate on their projects is 50% because they are going to competitors. that they are turning down work because they can't find enough construction workers, and his

number one biggest problem is lack of skilled workers. we are doing a number of things. we are asking every semiconductor company before they get our money to show us their workforce plan. we are -- as part of the money, the grant that we are giving to chips companies, a piece of it is for workforce. so you know, like intel, all these companies are getting tens of millions of dollars just to do workforce. and also we are developing a chips workforce center of excellence to train people. i think this has to be a moon shot. if we succeed, or if we fail with this chips effort it's because we haven't taken the workforce stuff seriously enough. which is why we are -- we have a whole workforce team that reports to me just to work with colleges, universities, labor unions, high schools to train people to go work in the semiconductor industry.

mr. morelle: i'll yield back and just comment. you don't have to respond it. seems to me for all the toubg -- talk about illegal immigration, we have hundreds of thousands of people who would like to come to the united states like my grandparents did to work in the united states, to fill critical jobs that we need to be successful with a low birth rate. maybe if we worked a reasonable thoughtful immigration policy we could meet some of the workforce challenges that all these companies, construction and health care and hospitality and the list goes on and on that we are desperately going to need. thanks for your comments. mr. chairman, i yield back. chair rogers: madam secretary, you have been very generous with your time and your opinions. secretary raimondo: hopefully not too generous in my opinions. chair rogers: we thank you for giving us this time together. we will look at your budget request in detail as we proceed. thank you for the work you are doing.

lots of good things happening. in a difficult world that we all of a sudden realize. we live in. so thank you for your work. this concludes today's hearing. we want to thank secretary raimondo for being here today with us. without objection, members may have seven days to submit additional questions for the record. the subcommittee stands adjourned. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2024] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] >> [indiscernible chatter]

>> thank you. >> [indiscernible chatter] >> thursday, the acting labor seetary testifies on worker ertime ptections. return to office plans and her agency's budget request for 2020 five. watch the senate appropriations subcommittee hearing live at 10:00 a.m. eastern on c-span three. c-span now, our free app. or online at c-span.org.

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