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Funding unleashes $125 billion in private investment from Micron to build leading-edge memory semiconductor and create more than 20,000 direct jobs.

Today, President Biden will travel to Syracuse, New York, to announce that the Department of Commerce has reached a preliminary agreement with Micron to provide up to ~$6.14 billion in direct funding under the CHIPS and Science Act. This investment will support the construction of two fabs in Clay, New York, and one fab in Boise, Idaho, unleashing $50 billion in private investment by 2030 as the first step towards Micron’s investment of up to $125 billion across both states over the next two decades to build a leading-edge memory manufacturing ecosystem. Micron’s total investment will be the largest private investment in New York and Idaho’s history, and will create over 70,000 jobs, including 20,000 direct construction and manufacturing jobs and tens of thousands of indirect jobs. During his visit, President Biden will discuss how his Investing in America agenda is building our economy from the middle out and bottom up, mobilizing an economic comeback in communities like Syracuse, and strengthening U.S. national security.

Semiconductors were invented in America and power everything from cell phones to electric vehicles, refrigerators, satellites, defense systems, and more. But today, the United States produces only about 10 percent of the world’s chips and none of the most advanced ones. Thanks to President Biden’s CHIPS and Science Act, that is changing. Companies have announced over $825 billion in investments in manufacturing and clean energy in the United States since the President took office, including in semiconductors. Semiconductor jobs and manufacturing are making a comeback. 

Back in 2022 and shortly after President Biden’s CHIPS and Science Act was signed into law, President Biden and Leader Schumer joined Micron in New York to recognize the company’s intention to invest in the Syracuse community. Today’s announcement is a major step in realizing the aspiration laid out on that day – that the United States will once again be a leader in global chip manufacturing. Leading-edge memory chips are critical for advanced technology, including artificial intelligence and advanced computing and communications.

Micron’s projects will create a robust leading-edge memory chip ecosystem and bring back leading-edge memory manufacturing to the United States for the first time in over 20 years:

• Clay, New York: Funding will support the construction of the first two fabs of a planned four fab “megafab” focused on leading-edge DRAM chip production. Each fab will have 600,000 square feet of cleanrooms, totaling 2.4 million square feet of cleanroom space across the four facilities—the largest amount of cleanroom space ever announced in the United States and the size of nearly 40 football fields.
  
• Boise, Idaho: Funding will support the development of a high-volume manufacturing (HVM) fab, with approximately 600,000 square feet of cleanroom space focused on the production of leading-edge DRAM chips. The fab would be co-located with the company’s existing, leading-edge R&D facility to improve efficiency across its R&D and manufacturing operations, reducing lags in technology transfer and cutting time-to-market for leading-edge memory products.

Creating Good-Paying and Union Jobs with Good Benefits Across America
Workforce Funding: President Biden promised to be the most pro-worker, pro-union President in American history, and his Administration has committed to ensuring that workers have the free and fair choice to join a union and equitable training pathways to good jobs. Today’s announcement includes at least $40 million in dedicated CHIPS funding for training and workforce development to ensure local communities have access to the jobs of the future. The focus of this funding will be further determined in the coming months based on the Department of Commerce’s labor and workforce priorities, in partnership with the Department of Labor.

Workforce Hubs: In addition, as part of the Administration’s effort to connect workers with good-paying jobs created by the President’s Investing in America agenda, today President Biden will announce four additional Investing in America Workforce Hubs – including one in Upstate New York, which will focus on semiconductor manufacturing – along with Milwaukee, Philadelphia, and Michigan. These hubs complement five existing Workforce Hubs, including those in Phoenix, Arizona, and Columbus, Ohio that have already catalyzed new semiconductor training programs.  These hubs will leverage and develop partnerships between companies, educational institutions, and labor unions to meet our nation’s workforce needs.

Project Labor Agreements: For these projects, Micron established two Project Labor Agreements (PLAs) at both the New York and Idaho sites for construction of new fabrication facilities. Both PLAs are the largest in each state’s history. These PLAs ensure that projects are completed efficiently and on time, while also supporting high quality jobs.

Registered Apprenticeships: To prepare for the thousands of jobs that will need to be filled, Micron is also leveraging Registered Apprenticeship programs to assist and propel underrepresented individuals to “earn-and-learn” and provide a pathway to well-paying careers. In New York, Micron has a partnership with the Manufacturers Association of Central New York. In Idaho, Micron established its first-ever Registered Apprenticeship Program in the state in partnership with the Idaho Manufacturing Alliance and College of Western Idaho. Micron is also joining DOL’s Advanced Manufacturing Sector Table of leading labor, industry, and workforce organizations committed to equitably building and growing the next generation of the manufacturing workforce here in the United States. The AFL-CIO Working for America Institute will support DOL’s Sector Table by working with Micron, the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), and other employer and labor organizations to develop, scale, and adopt a universal pathway curriculum for advanced manufacturing, including semiconductor manufacturing, to provide workers an onramp to good manufacturing jobs and create a pipeline of job-ready workers for employers across the country. Finally, Micron is also engaging with the AFT, its New York affiliates, the State of New York, and teachers to develop a training framework based on foundational and technical skills found throughout the semiconductor industry to engage and train students.

Good Jobs Principles: Micron has established itself as a leader on workforce issues, including by living up to the Department of Commerce’s and Labor’s Good Jobs Principles, which includes offering living wage starting salaries, opportunities for promotion—including for individuals from diverse and non-traditional backgrounds—a comprehensive benefits package, and an organizational culture that encourages feedback from all members to help Micron retain talent and strengthen its workforce over time.

Child Care: Micron has committed to providing affordable, accessible, high-quality child care for its workers across its facilities, and is building new child care facilities in both Idaho and New York, as well as partnering with local child care providers to provide subsidized care.

Right to Organize: Micron has affirmed it respects workers’ rights to organize, to share feedback without fear of reprisal, and to collectively bargain. The Administration strongly supports these rights, and expects Micron to neither hold mandatory captive audience meetings nor hire anti-union consultants. Micron and the Communications Workers of America (CWA) plan to meet to discuss labor peace. The Administration also plans to convene industrial unions and CHIPS companies to discuss workforce issues.

Sustainability: Micron is committed to delivering on its existing sustainability framework for the design and operations of its new facility, which includes planning to use 100% renewable electricity at the facilities and mitigating greenhouse gases. These efforts support Micron’s global target to achieve net-zero emissions from operations and purchased energy by 2050.

Rebuilding America’s Communities
Today’s announcement is part of the President’s commitment to revitalize communities that for too long have been overlooked by federal investment. This investment is symbolic of how innovation, national security, and economic competitiveness can bring back communities that were once powerhouses. Syracuse was a manufacturing hub during World War II, when General Electric began building engines, vacuum tubes, and radar systems for the military. After powering the country to victory in World War II, families in Syracuse were left behind by decades of failed trickle-down policies. Factory closures led to jobs flowing overseas, increased rates of poverty, and a decline in income.

President Biden came to office with a different agenda – to leave no community behind and build the economy from the middle out and bottom up. Today’s announcement is coupled with ongoing, targeted investments in the Syracuse region. For example, the Department of Commerce designated upstate New York as a Tech Hub; the President’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law is investing $180 million in the I-81 viaduct project to reconnect communities in Syracuse divided by transportation infrastructure; the Department of Energy and National Grid are investing a combined $140 million in upstate New York’s electric system; and the Environmental Protection Agency awarded $23 million in funding to clean up industrial waste. These investments set the stage for a new chapter in Syracuse’s economic history.

Now, the Syracuse region is making a comeback. After 22,000 jobs disappeared from the Syracuse region under the prior Administration, President Biden has added 25,000 jobs in Syracuse and over 1 million jobs statewide in New York. And workers are taking home more – real per capita personal income is up nearly 5%. Micron’s new investment is expected to create tens of thousands of jobs across suppliers and supporting industries – on top of the approximately 20,000 manufacturing and construction jobs it will directly employ – fostering a more resilient semiconductor supply chain in the U.S.

Building on Historic Progress Under the CHIPS and Science Act
Today’s announcement is the seventh preliminary memorandum of terms (PMT)

under the CHIPS and Science Act:

• In April 2024, the Administration announced $6.4 billion for Samsung to build leading-edge logic, R&D, and advanced packaging fabs in Taylor, TX, and to expand a current-generation and mature-node facility in Austin, TX.
  
• In April 2024, the Administration announced $6.6 billion for Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company to support the development of three greenfield leading-edge fabs in Phoenix, AZ.
  
• In March 2024, the Administration announced $8.5 billion for Intel to support investments across four states, (Chandler, AZ; Rio Rancho, NM; New Albany, OH; and Hillsboro, OR) to construct new leading-edge logic fabs, modernize advanced packaging facilities, and invest in R&D.
  
• In February 2024, the Administration announced $1.5 billion for GlobalFoundries to support the development and expansion of facilities in Malta, NY, and Burlington, VT.
  
• In January 2024, the Administration announced $162 million for Microchip Technology Inc. to increase its production of microcontroller units and other specialty semiconductors, and to support the modernization and expansion of fabrication facilities in Colorado Springs, CO, and Gresham, OR.
  
• In December 2023, the Administration announced $35 million for BAE Systems Electronic Systems to support the modernization of the company’s Microelectronics Center in Nashua, NH. This facility will produce chips that are essential to our national security, including for use in F-35 fighter jets.

President Biden’s Investing in America agenda – including the CHIPS and Science Act – is spurring a manufacturing and clean energy boom. Since President Biden took office through the end of March 2024, companies have announced over $825 billion in private sector investments in manufacturing and clean energy, and over 50,000 infrastructure and clean energy projects are underway. This announcement is part of the President’s broader commitment to build an economy from the middle out and bottom up, not the top down, and invest in all of America. 

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Since Day One, President Biden has led and delivered on the most ambitious climate and environmental justice agenda in history, including securing the largest-ever climate investment. The power sector, which is responsible for a quarter of annual U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, now has more tools than ever – including unprecedented financial support, efficient permitting, and long-term regulatory certainty – to reduce pollution and upgrade the grid to support more factories, electric vehicles, and other growing sources of electricity demand. Today, the Biden-Harris Administration is announcing key actions to build on this momentum and deliver clean electricity to more homes and businesses, helping lower energy costs for American families and power the U.S. manufacturing renaissance driven by President Biden’s Investing in America agenda, while providing cleaner air and water to communities long overburdened by pollution from fossil fuel power plants.
 
Today, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is announcing a suite of standards to cut greenhouse gas emissions as well as toxic air pollution, water pollution, and land contamination from fossil fuel power plants. EPA’s greenhouse gas emission standards will avoid 1.38 billion metric tons of carbon pollution through 2047, equivalent to the annual emissions of 328 million gas cars, and together with the other standards will provide hundreds of billions of dollars in climate, environmental justice, and public health benefits, including fewer premature deaths, asthma cases, and lost work and school days. The standards announced today will ensure that power companies use modern, cost-effective technologies to reduce pollution and protect the health and wellbeing of communities, including communities historically overburdened by pollution.
 
The Department of Energy (DOE) is announcing up to $331 million through President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law for a new transmission line that will be built with union labor – the latest awards from the Administration’s $30 billion investment in strengthening America’s electric grid infrastructure. A capacity contract from the Transmission Facilitation Program (TFP) will support a new 285-mile transmission line from Idaho to Nevada, bringing more than 2,000 Megawatts of needed transmission capacity to the region. The Southwest Intertie Project-North is expected to provide hundreds of jobs to workers with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.
 
Alongside this critical investment, DOE is releasing a final rule to make federal permitting of new transmission lines more efficient, ensuring meaningful engagement with Tribes, local communities, and other stakeholders. The rule establishes the Coordinated Interagency Transmission Authorization and Permits (CITAP) program, which aims to improve coordination across agencies, create efficiencies, and establish a standard two-year timeline for federal transmission authorizations and permits. The CITAP program gives transmission developers a new option for a more efficient review process, a major step to provide increased confidence for the sector to invest in new transmission lines.
 
DOE is also issuing a final rule to create an even faster track for completing environmental reviews of upgrades to existing transmission lines, which will increase reliability and lower energy costs. The rule creates a categorical exclusion, the simplest form of review under the National Environmental Policy Act, for projects that use existing transmission rights of way, such as reconductoring projects, as well as for solar and energy storage projects on already disturbed lands.
 
Additionally, today, the Administration is launching an effort to mobilize public and private sector leaders to expand the capacity of the existing U.S. transmission network, setting an ambition to upgrade 100,000 miles of transmission lines over the next five years. The Administration has made funding available through the Grid Resilience and Innovation Partnership (GRIP) program to support upgrades to existing transmission lines, and DOE’s categorical exclusion issued today will speed up the process to upgrade existing lines. The power sector can achieve this ambition primarily by deploying modern grid technologies like high-performance conductors and dynamic line ratings that enable existing transmission lines to carry more power. As a complement to building new lines, deploying solutions like these offer fast and cost-effective ways to unlock hundreds of gigawatts of additional clean energy, increase system reliability and resilience, reduce grid congestion, and cut energy costs.
 
These efforts all work in tandem – historic investments from President Biden’s Investing in America agenda that are making America a magnet for clean energy investment; continued permitting progress to get projects up and running; and smart standards to provide rules of the road for power companies, enabling them to seize the unprecedented opportunities to deliver clean electricity across the country. These steps – which are part of a broader slate of Earth Week announcements – build on President Biden’s actions since Day One to tackle the climate crisis and advance environmental justice.
 
Upgrading the Electric Grid for Reliability and Resilience
President Biden’s Investing in America agenda is delivering the largest investment in grid infrastructure in history—more than $30 billion from the Inflation Reduction Act and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. These investments will help deliver reliable, affordable electricity to families and businesses, prepare for worsening natural disasters that strain the grid, and unlock the economic and environmental benefits of clean energy. To help expand the transmission system at the pace necessary to confront the climate crisis, today’s actions and additional recent steps will help streamline permitting and overcome financial hurdles:
 

• Completing a New Transmission Line: Today the Department of the Interior (DOI) is celebrating the completion of the Ten West Link transmission line from Arizona to California. The line began transmitting electricity today and will increase reliability and unlock more than 3,200 megawatts of capacity from solar projects. DOI approved the construction of this project in 2022.
  
• Continuing to Invest in Grid Upgrades: Last week applications closed for up to $2.7 billion in DOE grant funding under the second round of the Grid Resilience and Innovation Partnerships (GRIP) program for projects to upgrade and modernize the transmission and distribution system to increase reliability and resilience. This builds upon $3.46 billion in projects selected for grid upgrades in October 2023, which are funded by President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.
  
• Charting the Future of the Grid to Meet Emerging Challenges: Last week DOE released the 2024 Future of Resource Adequacy Report to lay out solutions to meet increasing electricity demand while cutting emissions and maintaining affordability. DOE also released the Innovative Grid Deployment Liftoff Report to chart pathways to deployment of modern, commercially available transmission and distribution technologies that could support 20 to 100 gigawatts of peak demand.

Revitalizing U.S. Manufacturing and Securing Clean Energy Supply Chains
Thanks to incentives from President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act and Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the clean energy future will be made in America. Under the Biden-Harris Administration, private companies have invested almost $80 billion in clean energy manufacturing. Strengthening U.S. clean energy supply chains not only benefits American workers but also makes it easier to deploy clean energy even faster to cut emissions. Recent actions continue the progress to build and secure domestic supply chains and ensure that the U.S. will lead the world in clean energy manufacturing:

• Expanding U.S. Clean Energy Manufacturing and Creating Good-Paying Jobs: The Treasury Department and DOE recently announced $4 billion in Inflation Reduction Act tax credit allocations for over 100 manufacturing projects across 35 states under the Qualifying Advanced Energy Project Tax Credit (48C). This includes projects to manufacture transformers and grid components, electric vehicle components and chargers, and transmission cables, produce clean steel, and process critical minerals and materials. These allocations include $1.5 billion for projects in historic energy communities that have experienced closure of coal mines and power plants.
  
• Securing the U.S. Nuclear Fuel Supply Chain: Last week, DOE announced several milestones on the path to establish a domestic fuel supply chain for nuclear energy and reduce our reliance on imports. DOE recently closed the requests for proposal to purchase high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU) needed for advanced nuclear reactors, which is part of a $700 million program secured through the Inflation Reduction Act. Moreover, an enrichment plant (located in Piketon, Ohio) produced the first 100 kilograms of civilian HALEU ever in the United States with future plans to expand to 900 kilograms. U.S. capabilities will increase further thanks to an additional $2.7 billion made available from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law in the Fiscal Year 2024 Energy and Water Development, which, when paired with $2.2 billion from France and the United Kingdom meets and exceeds a commitment made last fall at COP28 to pool funds to develop a safe and secure global supply chain.

Deploying Clean Energy to Meet America’s Power Needs
The President’s Investing in America agenda has unleashed unprecedented investment in deployment of clean energy technologies, attracting hundreds of billions of dollars in private sector investment and creating over 270,000 new clean energy jobs. The Administration is taking additional steps to accelerate buildout of clean energy and remove roadblocks to deployment to ensure that new clean energy resources can come online fast to meet growing demand. Recent actions include:

• Accelerating Offshore Wind Deployment: Yesterday DOI announced plans for the next five years of offshore wind leasing, as well as a final rule to modernize offshore wind regulations. Over the next 20 years, the final rule is expected to result in cost savings of roughly $1.9 billion to the offshore renewable energy industry, savings that can be passed onto consumers or used to invest in additional job-creating clean energy projects.  Additionally, DOE released the Offshore Wind Liftoff Report, charting a path to success for the next wave of projects through continued innovation and cost reductions, along with DOE’s latest steps to support offshore wind manufacturing and transmission development.  Through these actions, the Biden-Harris Administration continues to support state leadership and use every tool available to responsibly grow an American offshore wind industry that will create thousands of good-paying jobs, including federal investments and approvals under President Biden’s leadership of 10 gigawatts of commercial-scale offshore wind projects, with the first two already providing power to the grid, as well as over 1 million acres newly leased to provide offshore wind opportunities for years ahead.
  
• Promoting Development of Renewable Energy on Public Lands: This month DOI issued a final rule to reduce fees for solar and wind projects on public lands by 80 percent and announced that DOI has now permitted more than 25 gigawatts of clean energy projects on public lands, surpassing a major milestone ahead of 2025.
  
• Speeding Up Process to Connect New Power Plants to the Grid: Last week DOE released the Transmission Interconnection Roadmap, a first-of-its-kind report laying out solutions to accelerate the process to connect clean energy projects to the grid and reduce wait times for new solar, wind, and battery projects. The Roadmap complements $10 million that DOE recently made available for analytical tools and other approaches to accelerate the interconnection process. Additionally, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission is moving forward to implement a series of major transmission reforms, including a final rule to streamline the interconnection process.
  
• Taking Advantage of Extensive Geothermal Energy Resources:  Last week DOI adopted categorical exclusions to expedite the review and approval of geothermal energy exploration on public lands. In addition, DOE recently released a new Pathways to Commercial Liftoff report on geothermal power, which showed how U.S. geothermal energy production could grow by a factor of 20 to 90 Gigawatts by 2050.
  
• Improving the State and Local Renewable Energy Siting Process: Last week DOE opened a funding opportunity for state-based collaboratives to build capacity to improve renewable energy planning and siting processes. This funding, supported by the Inflation Reduction Act, will accelerate the siting process to bring renewable energy online faster while improving outcomes for host communities, local governments, and disadvantaged communities.

Ensuring All Communities Benefit from Clean Energy
From Day One, President Biden has prioritized ensuring that all communities benefit from clean energy deployment, including the energy communities and workers that have powered our nation for generations and the low-income households that are burdened with high energy bills. The Administration has followed through on these commitments—not just talking about coal and power plant communities but investing in them. The President’s Investing in America agenda is creating good-paying and union jobs in energy communities, bringing solar energy to low-income households to reduce energy bills, supporting community engagement and improved outcomes for state and local permitting, and increasing grid reliability and resilience through distributed energy solutions. The President’s Justice40 Initiative sets a goal that 40% of the overall benefits of certain federal in climate, clean energy, and other investments flow to disadvantaged communities that have been marginalized by underinvestment and overburdened by pollution. Recent actions continue this progress:

• Reducing Energy Bills for Low-Income Households: This week the EPA announced $7 billion to deploy solar energy for low-income communities through the Solar for All program, funded by the Inflation Reduction Act. The 60 selections will provide funding to support 60 states, territories, Tribal governments, municipalities, and nonprofits to enable low-income and disadvantaged communities to benefit from solar, cutting annual electricity bills by more than $350 million for low-income households, creating an estimated 200,000 jobs, and increasing grid reliability.
  
• Deploying Clean Energy in Energy Communities: DOE recently announced up to $475 million for five projects in Arizona, Kentucky, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia to accelerate clean energy deployment on current and former mine lands. The projects, supported by President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, will deploy geothermal, pumped-storage hydropower, solar, and battery storage and will spur new economic opportunities in communities that have helped power the nation for generations.
  
• Building Opportunities for Coal and Power Plant Communities to Continue Powering America: DOE recently released an information guide and technical study for communities and stakeholders who are considering replacing their coal plants with nuclear. Coal-to-nuclear transition can significantly reduce the cost of nuclear plant construction, while creating new high-paying jobs, increasing community income and revenue, and improving public health. DOE’s study found that, with adequate planning and training support, most workers at an existing coal plant should be able to transition to work at a replacement nuclear plant.
  
• Building a National Network to Finance Local Clean Energy Projects: This month the EPA announced $20 billion in grant awards under two competitions from the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund to create a national network to fund tens of thousands of climate and clean energy projects across America, especially in communities historically left behind and overburdened by pollution. One selectee, the Green Bank for Rural America, will help bring clean energy to rural America and energy communities, with a particular focus on Appalachia, helping ensure that the communities that have powered the nation for a century do not get left behind in the energy transition.
  
• Funding Microgrids for Tribal Communities:  DOE recently announced a $72.8 million conditional commitment to fund a solar-plus-storage microgrid on the Tribal lands of the Viejas Band of the Kumeyaay Indians. This will reduce the cost of energy, power local commercial business, create 250 construction jobs prioritizing Tribal, minority and veteran-owned contractors, and enhance the Tribal energy sovereignty.
  
• Advancing Environmental Justice: Through the Justice40 Initiative, 518 programs across 19 federal agencies are being reimagined and transformed to ensure the benefits reach the communities that need them most. Federal agencies are making this happen with the Climate and Economic Justice Screening Tool, which is used to identify communities that benefit from the Justice40 Initiative.

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The post FACT SHEET: Biden-Harris Administration Announces Key Actions to Strengthen America’s Electric Grid, Boost Clean Energy Deployment and Manufacturing Jobs, and Cut Dangerous Pollution from the Power Sector appeared first on The White House.

Introduction

The President’s Investing in America agenda delivers historic public investments to American communities through legislation like the American Rescue Plan, Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the CHIPS and Science Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act. These investments are crowding-in private investment into critical industries—to date, private companies have announced $825 billion in investments in growing industries like semiconductors, clean energy, and electric vehicles—and creating hundreds of thousands of jobs.

Creation of high-quality jobs for American workers is central to the President’s economic growth agenda. Already, since President Biden took office, the economy has added 15 million jobs while the unemployment rate fell to its lowest level in half of a century, remaining below 4 percent for a record 26 months. But as the President’s agenda brings clean energy and manufacturing back to America after decades of offshoring, the Biden-Harris Administration recognizes that this transition won’t be fully achieved if we don’t build the workforce we need. Expanded commitments to workforce development are necessary to successfully create durable, lasting industries through the Investing in America agenda.

As described in the Administration’s Roadmap to Support Good Jobs, the Biden-Harris Administration’s workforce strategy has four central priorities. First, it is designed to connect people to good jobs, including through evidence-backed training solutions like registered apprenticeships and other high-quality “earn and learn” pathways, and supportive services like child care that expand opportunity for American workers. Second, it is focused on ensuring that we have a skilled, diverse workforce for our transformational investments, with targeted workforce programs that align with growing sectors like clean energy and manufacturing that President Biden’s agenda has focused on. Third it ensures every community can meet its foundational labor needs, with policies designed to support short- and long-term labor supply in critical sectors like health care and transportation that often struggle to recruit and retain talented workers. Fourth, it prioritizes the creation of good-paying jobs with benefits, safety, stability, and worker voice to ensure that American families and businesses thrive.

This blog provides additional detail on the economic context for the President’s workforce strategy along with, for each of these priorities, recent actions taken, and recent progress in enacting them. 

The economics of the President’s workforce strategy

President Biden took office in the midst of a global pandemic with staggering economic consequences. In January 2021, the unemployment rate was 6.4 percent and the labor force participation rate was 61.3 percent—two percentage points below the rate only a year earlier. However, the workforce problems did not begin with the 2020 pandemic. The United States had seen a multi-decade-long decline in the labor force participation rate for workers between the ages of 25 to 54, falling behind many of its peer countries. In manufacturing communities, the offshoring of domestic manufacturing in the 1990s and early 2000s led to the loss, by 2011, of one million U.S. manufacturing jobs and 2.4 million jobs overall.

President Biden came into office determined to address these challenges. His American Rescue Plan enabled the strongest recovery in decades. And moving forward, external estimates predict that over the next decade, the Administration’s Investing in America agenda will create more than a million jobs in industries like construction and manufacturing. In addition to making bold investments in 21st century infrastructure and industries, President Biden has an evidence-backed workforce strategy designed to ensure that all Americans have the opportunity to get a good, well-paid job in their community.

The Administration has made investments in evidence-backed training programs that ensure employers and counselors can play an active role in providing workers with the skills they actually need in industries with actual demand for labor. Research shows that demand-driven, sector-focused employment programs can not only increase employment in targeted sectors, but also have positive effects on earnings—especially for underserved workers entering these programs. These initiatives do not require students or workers to know on their own what skills the future job market requires. Instead, programs that produce the largest and most persistent earnings gains make strong connections to employers to determine in-demand jobs and skills. These programs also tend to provide larger investments per participant, upfront screening of participants on basic skills and motivation, and wraparound support services for participants.

Registered Apprenticeship programs have been shown to be particularly effective at increasing workers’ earning potential. A study of apprenticeships in 10 states finds that, over their lifetime, individuals who completed their training earned an average of $240,037 more than nonparticipants, with net social benefits of $49,000 over the course of the apprentice’s career. Apprenticeships also benefit employers; one study found that, on average, for every $1.00 invested, employers receive $1.44 in direct and indirect benefits in the years during and after training an apprentice.

The Biden-Harris Administration invests holistically in places across the United States, so that workers can get jobs in their communities. Job programs that are targeted towards regions that have been underinvested in can have particularly strong payoffs. One recent study found that the economic benefits of policies that add jobs in a given place (such as government-funded infrastructure projects) are at least 60 percent greater in “distressed” regions than in “booming” ones.

The President’s investments to empower and educate workers are already paying off. After Georgia received over $37 billion in private investments for clean energy technology, the city of Augusta has partnered with five major regional employers to develop their workforce and meet this increased demand through an Investing in America Workforce Hub. Terrence Tillman, a recent graduate of a newly expanded apprenticeship program, said “This is going to change my lifestyle. […] Knowing what the job entails and what its purpose is, I feel like I’m helping the country and the community.” Augusta is emblematic of how the Investing in America agenda can deliver good paying jobs and prepare the workforce for the future.

The President’s workforce strategy prioritizes job quality. An extensive economic literature lays out the benefits of improved job quality for workers, households, and businesses. By improving job quality, employers can more easily attract and retain workers—benefitting their bottom line. At the same time, improved job quality enables workers to bring home the pay and benefits that provide an opportunity to reach the middle class, which in turn supports economic growth.

Paying workers fair wages and providing benefits like paid leave can increase productivity, reduce turnover, and facilitate hiring and retention. Providing childcare lowers turnover while increasing the likelihood that parents can invest in training or additional education and work (especially full-time). Manufacturing firms that focus on job quality, like increasing pay and providing avenues for workers to have inputs into the firms’ practices, are better able to attract skilled workers, experience lower turnover, and generate higher productivity. Similarly, unions are already playing a central role in developing and training the workforce for the President’s investments in America.

Conclusion

President Biden has prioritized the creation of high-quality jobs for American workers in two ways—a strong and rapid labor market recovery and a comprehensive workforce strategy that prepares workers for the 21st century economy. As a result, while forecasters predicted that in 2023 the economy would fall into a recession, the US economy grew at a healthy 3.4 percent in the fourth quarter of 2023, added over 15 million jobs, saw the unemployment rate fall below 4 percent for a record 26 months, and hit a record low gap between the highest and lowest state unemployment rates. Further, employment growth remains solid in specific industries where growth has been catalyzed by the Investing in America agenda—since January 2021, the economy has added 848,000 jobs in construction, 768,000 jobs in manufacturing, and 27,500 jobs in clean energy employment.

The Biden-Harris Administration is committed to making the necessary investments to connect Americans to good jobs, prepare them for our transformation investments, ensure every community can meet its foundational labor needs, and boost job quality. Case in point: President Biden’s FY25 Budget proposes a new $8 billion Career Training Fund that would provide approximately 750,000 workers with training and wrap-around supports, as well as funds to expand public-private partnerships to offer high-quality training in growing industries. Investments like these lay the foundation for a thriving U.S. economy and strong, shared, and stable economic growth.

The post Following Up on the Four Priorities of President Biden’s Workforce Strategy appeared first on The White House.

Today, President Biden will announce four new Workforce Hubs to ensure all Americans can access the good jobs created by the President’s Investing in America agenda, which includes the American Rescue Plan, the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the CHIPS and Science Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act. President Biden will make the announcement during his visit to Syracuse, New York, to highlight a CHIPS and Science Act preliminary agreement with Micron to dramatically expand semiconductor manufacturing in the United States. The Upstate New York region will be one of the four new Workforce Hubs, in addition to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and the state of Michigan.

Since the beginning of the Biden-Harris Administration, private companies have announced over $825 billion in manufacturing and clean energy investments, on top of $478 billion already announced by the Administration for clean energy and infrastructure projects funded by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation Reduction Act. These investments are projected to create hundreds of thousands of good jobs—many of which do not require a college degree. The Biden-Harris Administration is committed to ensuring that all workers—including women, people of color, veterans, and those that have been historically left behind–have equitable access to those job opportunities and the training and skills needed to fill them.
 
Today’s announcement also builds on the inaugural five Investing in America Workforce Hubs in Columbus, Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Augusta, and Phoenix that First Lady Jill Biden announced last May. Over the last year, the inaugural Hubs have generated dozens of significant commitments to create pipelines to good jobs, including an initiative to train 10,000 skilled construction workers in Columbus, Ohio, the first-ever registered apprenticeship program in semiconductor manufacturing at TSMC in Phoenix, and project labor agreements on $9 billion worth of infrastructure projects across Maryland. In each of the four new Hubs, the Administration will expand the successful models developed in the first round of Workforce Hubs and will continue to collaborate with state and local elected officials and community leaders to drive effective place-based workforce development efforts that are essential to the President’s vision of building an economy from the bottom up and the middle out.
 
The next four Investing in America Workforce Hubs are:  

• Upstate New York: Upstate New York has emerged as a growing hub for semiconductor manufacturing, with record-breaking investments throughout the region. To date, companies have announced hundreds of billions of dollars in private-sector investments to regain American leadership in chips manufacturing since President Biden signed his CHIPS and Science Act. And today, President Biden is announcing a $6.1 billion preliminary agreement of terms with Micron to invest in semiconductor manufacturing in New York and Idaho, which will create over 70,000 jobs. The Department of Commerce, with support from the Departments of Education and Labor, will stand up a Workforce Hub to help meet the training needs of this nascent industry and related investments in the region by fostering collaborations with partners such as labor unions, employers, and education and training providers.
• Michigan: The state of Michigan has long been the engine of the American auto industry — and the good-paying union jobs that built the American middle class. As the country accelerates into an electric vehicle (EV) future, President Biden is committed to ensuring that the workers, unions, and businesses that have historically powered the auto industry lead the next generation of clean vehicles. President Biden strongly believes that auto companies transitioning to new technology should retool, reboot, and rehire in the same factories and in the same communities with comparable wages. Building on significant efforts underway – including President Biden’s $15.5 billion investment in the retooling of existing auto plants and rehiring of existing workers for the EV transition –  the Department of Energy and Department of Labor will partner with the State of Michigan to launch an Electric Vehicle Workforce Hub.
• Milwaukee: Last December, the City of Milwaukee announced that—thanks to funding from President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and in response to proposed rulemaking from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)— the City would reduce its timeline for replacing 100% of its lead pipes from 60 years to the 10 years outlined in the proposed rule. This announcement aligns with President Biden’s broader goal to remove all lead pipes across the nation within a decade. The EPA, with support from the Department of Transportation (DOT), will stand up a Workforce Hub to ensure the city has the skilled workers needed to accomplish this ambitious lead pipes replacement project and invest in clean water infrastructure in Milwaukee.
• Philadelphia: The City of Philadelphia has received billions of dollars in funding for public infrastructure—including clean water infrastructure and improved roadway safety. DOT and EPA will co-lead this Hub to ensure the city has strong workforce pipelines for all residents to access good jobs replacing lead pipes and investing in construction and infrastructure.

These new Workforce Hubs will align with the Roadmap to Support Good Jobs, the Biden-Harris Administration’s comprehensive approach to ensure that every American—whether they go to college or not—has equitable access to high-quality training, education, and services that provide a path to a good career without leaving their community. A new analysis released today from the Council of Economic Advisors outlines the economics behind the Administration’s workforce strategy and underscores how it has led to record-breaking job growth.

Progress to Date
The Investing in America Workforce Hubs build on the Biden-Harris Administration’s existing whole-of-government effort to advance high-quality workforce development, including:
Building new pipelines to connect Americans to good jobs

• The Administration has invested more than $440 million since the President took office  to expand Registered Apprenticeships and pre-apprenticeships, supporting the education and training needs of more than 1 million apprentices.
• President Biden signed a Registered Apprenticeship Executive Order to bolster apprenticeships in the federal workforce.
• The Department of Education launched the first-ever Career-Connected High School grants program, supporting 19 districts and states reimagining the high school experience to better connect to career pathways.
• The Department of Labor has provided $200 million in Strengthening Community College grants since 2021, supporting quality workforce programs around the country.
• The Department of Labor released the High Road Training Program Map to spotlight high-quality training programs and show where they are located relative to projects mobilized by the Investing in America agenda.
• In January, the White House announced new commitments to its Advanced Manufacturing Sprint, including 150 new advanced manufacturing-related Registered Apprenticeship programs and occupations have been created or are newly under development, and more than 4,700 new apprentices hired in advanced manufacturing occupations.

Making place-based workforce investments so every community can meet its foundational labor needs
In addition to the nine Investing in America Workforce Hubs that are training residents for growing industries like clean energy and manufacturing, the Biden-Harris Administration has:

• Announced the designation of 31 communities across the country as Regional Innovation and Technology Hubs (Tech Hubs).
• Announced the 22 finalists of the Distressed Area Recompete Pilot Program. Recompete will invest $200 million in economic and workforce development projects that connect workers to good jobs in geographically diverse and persistently distressed communities across the country. 
• Stood up the National Semiconductor Training Center, which will deploy $5 billion in semiconductor-related research, development, and workforce needs to deliver on the CHIPS and Science Act.
• Invested tens of billions of dollars from the American Rescue Plan in workforce development strategies. Through the State and Local Fiscal Recovery Fund, which provided funding to every single local government across the country, more than 2,000 state and local governments have invested over $13 billion in workforce development and worker supports projects.
• Funded 32 coalitions across the country through the American Rescue Plan’s $500 million Good Jobs Challenge. As of December 2023, over 11,000 participants have entered training programs as a direct result of the program and thousands of workers have secured good, quality jobs in high-demand industries like construction, manufacturing, clean tech, forestry, and healthcare.

Boosting job quality to support recruitment and retention

• For the first time in nearly 40 years, the Department of Labor updated its Davis-Bacon regulations to modernize and strengthen prevailing wage rates for workers on federally funded construction projects, which will raise wages for 1 million construction workers over time.
• The National Labor Relations Board issued a decision announcing a new framework for union representation proceedings—where if an employer commits any unfair labor practices during a representation election, the Board will order the employer to recognize and bargain with the union, rather than re-running the election.
• The Department of Energy is requiring grant applicants to submit Community Benefits Plans to access Investing in America funding.
• Nearly all of the significant construction programs contained in President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, CHIPS and Science Act, and Inflation Reduction Act require or strongly incentivize the use of Davis-Bacon prevailing wages.
• The Inflation Reduction Act offers incentives that increase the value of clean energy tax credits by five times if employers pay prevailing wages and employ registered apprentices.
• The Department of Commerce required major CHIPS and Science Act awardees provide high-quality child care to their employees.
• The American Rescue Plan provided $24 billion to help child care providers keep their doors open – including over $2 billion for higher pay, hiring or retention bonuses, or other expanded benefits for care workers. Recent analysis shows that this funding led to an increase in the labor force participation rate of mothers with young children of about 3 percentage points relative to similar groups.

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Today—on World Malaria Day—we recommit to ending this disease for everyone, everywhere.
 
Malaria is one of the world’s deadliest diseases. In 1951, the United States eliminated malaria in our country. And with strong bipartisan support in Congress, we’ve led the fight to eliminate this disease worldwide—saving nearly 12 million lives and preventing more than two billion infections since 2000.
 
But despite this progress, nearly half the global population remains vulnerable to malaria—living in constant fear that they will lose their lives because of a mosquito bite. And last year, after two decades of no domestically-acquired cases of malaria, ten cases were reported in the United States. While the individuals were successfully treated, and the spread was halted, it was a solemn reminder of the urgent need to continue preventing and treating the disease globally.
 
That is exactly what my Administration is doing. We’ve expanded the U.S. President’s Malaria Initiative, and are now partnering with 30 countries to bring life-saving tools and treatments to people in need. We also hosted the seventh replenishment for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, raising a historically high level of funding from global donors. And, the United States has been a driving force behind deployment of the first-ever malaria vaccine. When combined with other prevention tools—such as mosquito nets and preventive medicines—these vaccines have the potential to save millions of children’s lives around the world.
 
To all those living in fear of malaria: the United States sees you. We stand with you. And together, we can—and will—end this disease.

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Funding unleashes $125 billion in private investment from Micron to build leading-edge memory semiconductor and create more than 20,000 direct jobs.

Today, President Biden will travel to Syracuse, New York, to announce that the Department of Commerce has reached a preliminary agreement with Micron to provide up to ~$6.14 billion in direct funding under the CHIPS and Science Act. This investment will support the construction of two fabs in Clay, New York, and one fab in Boise, Idaho, unleashing $50 billion in private investment by 2030 as the first step towards Micron’s investment of up to $125 billion across both states over the next two decades to build a leading-edge memory manufacturing ecosystem. Micron’s total investment will be the largest private investment in New York and Idaho’s history, and will create over 70,000 jobs, including 20,000 direct construction and manufacturing jobs and tens of thousands of indirect jobs. During his visit, President Biden will discuss how his Investing in America agenda is building our economy from the middle out and bottom up, mobilizing an economic comeback in communities like Syracuse, and strengthening U.S. national security.

Semiconductors were invented in America and power everything from cell phones to electric vehicles, refrigerators, satellites, defense systems, and more. But today, the United States produces only about 10 percent of the world’s chips and none of the most advanced ones. Thanks to President Biden’s CHIPS and Science Act, that is changing. Companies have announced over $825 billion in investments in manufacturing and clean energy in the United States since the President took office, including in semiconductors. Semiconductor jobs and manufacturing are making a comeback. 

Back in 2022 and shortly after President Biden’s CHIPS and Science Act was signed into law, President Biden and Leader Schumer joined Micron in New York to recognize the company’s intention to invest in the Syracuse community. Today’s announcement is a major step in realizing the aspiration laid out on that day – that the United States will once again be a leader in global chip manufacturing. Leading-edge memory chips are critical for advanced technology, including artificial intelligence and advanced computing and communications.

Micron’s projects will create a robust leading-edge memory chip ecosystem and bring back leading-edge memory manufacturing to the United States for the first time in over 20 years:

• Clay, New York: Funding will support the construction of the first two fabs of a planned four fab “megafab” focused on leading-edge DRAM chip production. Each fab will have 600,000 square feet of cleanrooms, totaling 2.4 million square feet of cleanroom space across the four facilities—the largest amount of cleanroom space ever announced in the United States and the size of nearly 40 football fields.
  
• Boise, Idaho: Funding will support the development of a high-volume manufacturing (HVM) fab, with approximately 600,000 square feet of cleanroom space focused on the production of leading-edge DRAM chips. The fab would be co-located with the company’s existing, leading-edge R&D facility to improve efficiency across its R&D and manufacturing operations, reducing lags in technology transfer and cutting time-to-market for leading-edge memory products.

Creating Good-Paying and Union Jobs with Good Benefits Across America
Workforce Funding: President Biden promised to be the most pro-worker, pro-union President in American history, and his Administration has committed to ensuring that workers have the free and fair choice to join a union and equitable training pathways to good jobs. Today’s announcement includes at least $40 million in dedicated CHIPS funding for training and workforce development to ensure local communities have access to the jobs of the future. The focus of this funding will be further determined in the coming months based on the Department of Commerce’s labor and workforce priorities, in partnership with the Department of Labor.

Workforce Hubs: In addition, as part of the Administration’s effort to connect workers with good-paying jobs created by the President’s Investing in America agenda, today President Biden will announce four additional Investing in America Workforce Hubs – including one in Upstate New York, which will focus on semiconductor manufacturing – along with Milwaukee, Philadelphia, and Michigan. These hubs complement five existing Workforce Hubs, including those in Phoenix, Arizona, and Columbus, Ohio that have already catalyzed new semiconductor training programs.  These hubs will leverage and develop partnerships between companies, educational institutions, and labor unions to meet our nation’s workforce needs.

Project Labor Agreements: For these projects, Micron established two Project Labor Agreements (PLAs) at both the New York and Idaho sites for construction of new fabrication facilities. Both PLAs are the largest in each state’s history. These PLAs ensure that projects are completed efficiently and on time, while also supporting high quality jobs.

Registered Apprenticeships: To prepare for the thousands of jobs that will need to be filled, Micron is also leveraging Registered Apprenticeship programs to assist and propel underrepresented individuals to “earn-and-learn” and provide a pathway to well-paying careers. In New York, Micron has a partnership with the Manufacturers Association of Central New York. In Idaho, Micron established its first-ever Registered Apprenticeship Program in the state in partnership with the Idaho Manufacturing Alliance and College of Western Idaho. Micron is also joining DOL’s Advanced Manufacturing Sector Table of leading labor, industry, and workforce organizations committed to equitably building and growing the next generation of the manufacturing workforce here in the United States. The AFL-CIO Working for America Institute will support DOL’s Sector Table by working with Micron, the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), and other employer and labor organizations to develop, scale, and adopt a universal pathway curriculum for advanced manufacturing, including semiconductor manufacturing, to provide workers an onramp to good manufacturing jobs and create a pipeline of job-ready workers for employers across the country. Finally, Micron is also engaging with the AFT, its New York affiliates, the State of New York, and teachers to develop a training framework based on foundational and technical skills found throughout the semiconductor industry to engage and train students.

Good Jobs Principles: Micron has established itself as a leader on workforce issues, including by living up to the Department of Commerce’s and Labor’s Good Jobs Principles, which includes offering living wage starting salaries, opportunities for promotion—including for individuals from diverse and non-traditional backgrounds—a comprehensive benefits package, and an organizational culture that encourages feedback from all members to help Micron retain talent and strengthen its workforce over time.

Child Care: Micron has committed to providing affordable, accessible, high-quality child care for its workers across its facilities, and is building new child care facilities in both Idaho and New York, as well as partnering with local child care providers to provide subsidized care.

Right to Organize: Micron has affirmed it respects workers’ rights to organize, to share feedback without fear of reprisal, and to collectively bargain. The Administration strongly supports these rights, and expects Micron to neither hold mandatory captive audience meetings nor hire anti-union consultants. Micron and the Communications Workers of America (CWA) plan to meet to discuss labor peace. The Administration also plans to convene industrial unions and CHIPS companies to discuss workforce issues.

Sustainability: Micron is committed to delivering on its existing sustainability framework for the design and operations of its new facility, which includes planning to use 100% renewable electricity at the facilities and mitigating greenhouse gases. These efforts support Micron’s global target to achieve net-zero emissions from operations and purchased energy by 2050.

Rebuilding America’s Communities
Today’s announcement is part of the President’s commitment to revitalize communities that for too long have been overlooked by federal investment. This investment is symbolic of how innovation, national security, and economic competitiveness can bring back communities that were once powerhouses. Syracuse was a manufacturing hub during World War II, when General Electric began building engines, vacuum tubes, and radar systems for the military. After powering the country to victory in World War II, families in Syracuse were left behind by decades of failed trickle-down policies. Factory closures led to jobs flowing overseas, increased rates of poverty, and a decline in income.

President Biden came to office with a different agenda – to leave no community behind and build the economy from the middle out and bottom up. Today’s announcement is coupled with ongoing, targeted investments in the Syracuse region. For example, the Department of Commerce designated upstate New York as a Tech Hub; the President’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law is investing $180 million in the I-81 viaduct project to reconnect communities in Syracuse divided by transportation infrastructure; the Department of Energy and National Grid are investing a combined $140 million in upstate New York’s electric system; and the Environmental Protection Agency awarded $23 million in funding to clean up industrial waste. These investments set the stage for a new chapter in Syracuse’s economic history.

Now, the Syracuse region is making a comeback. After 22,000 jobs disappeared from the Syracuse region under the prior Administration, President Biden has added 25,000 jobs in Syracuse and over 1 million jobs statewide in New York. And workers are taking home more – real per capita personal income is up nearly 5%. Micron’s new investment is expected to create tens of thousands of jobs across suppliers and supporting industries – on top of the approximately 20,000 manufacturing and construction jobs it will directly employ – fostering a more resilient semiconductor supply chain in the U.S.

Building on Historic Progress Under the CHIPS and Science Act
Today’s announcement is the seventh preliminary memorandum of terms (PMT)

under the CHIPS and Science Act:

• In April 2024, the Administration announced $6.4 billion for Samsung to build leading-edge logic, R&D, and advanced packaging fabs in Taylor, TX, and to expand a current-generation and mature-node facility in Austin, TX.
  
• In April 2024, the Administration announced $6.6 billion for Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company to support the development of three greenfield leading-edge fabs in Phoenix, AZ.
  
• In March 2024, the Administration announced $8.5 billion for Intel to support investments across four states, (Chandler, AZ; Rio Rancho, NM; New Albany, OH; and Hillsboro, OR) to construct new leading-edge logic fabs, modernize advanced packaging facilities, and invest in R&D.
  
• In February 2024, the Administration announced $1.5 billion for GlobalFoundries to support the development and expansion of facilities in Malta, NY, and Burlington, VT.
  
• In January 2024, the Administration announced $162 million for Microchip Technology Inc. to increase its production of microcontroller units and other specialty semiconductors, and to support the modernization and expansion of fabrication facilities in Colorado Springs, CO, and Gresham, OR.
  
• In December 2023, the Administration announced $35 million for BAE Systems Electronic Systems to support the modernization of the company’s Microelectronics Center in Nashua, NH. This facility will produce chips that are essential to our national security, including for use in F-35 fighter jets.

President Biden’s Investing in America agenda – including the CHIPS and Science Act – is spurring a manufacturing and clean energy boom. Since President Biden took office through the end of March 2024, companies have announced over $825 billion in private sector investments in manufacturing and clean energy, and over 50,000 infrastructure and clean energy projects are underway. This announcement is part of the President’s broader commitment to build an economy from the middle out and bottom up, not the top down, and invest in all of America. 

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Since Day One, President Biden has led and delivered on the most ambitious climate and environmental justice agenda in history, including securing the largest-ever climate investment. The power sector, which is responsible for a quarter of annual U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, now has more tools than ever – including unprecedented financial support, efficient permitting, and long-term regulatory certainty – to reduce pollution and upgrade the grid to support more factories, electric vehicles, and other growing sources of electricity demand. Today, the Biden-Harris Administration is announcing key actions to build on this momentum and deliver clean electricity to more homes and businesses, helping lower energy costs for American families and power the U.S. manufacturing renaissance driven by President Biden’s Investing in America agenda, while providing cleaner air and water to communities long overburdened by pollution from fossil fuel power plants.
 
Today, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is announcing a suite of standards to cut greenhouse gas emissions as well as toxic air pollution, water pollution, and land contamination from fossil fuel power plants. EPA’s greenhouse gas emission standards will avoid 1.38 billion metric tons of carbon pollution through 2047, equivalent to the annual emissions of 328 million gas cars, and together with the other standards will provide hundreds of billions of dollars in climate, environmental justice, and public health benefits, including fewer premature deaths, asthma cases, and lost work and school days. The standards announced today will ensure that power companies use modern, cost-effective technologies to reduce pollution and protect the health and wellbeing of communities, including communities historically overburdened by pollution.
 
The Department of Energy (DOE) is announcing up to $331 million through President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law for a new transmission line that will be built with union labor – the latest awards from the Administration’s $30 billion investment in strengthening America’s electric grid infrastructure. A capacity contract from the Transmission Facilitation Program (TFP) will support a new 285-mile transmission line from Idaho to Nevada, bringing more than 2,000 Megawatts of needed transmission capacity to the region. The Southwest Intertie Project-North is expected to provide hundreds of jobs to workers with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.
 
Alongside this critical investment, DOE is releasing a final rule to make federal permitting of new transmission lines more efficient, ensuring meaningful engagement with Tribes, local communities, and other stakeholders. The rule establishes the Coordinated Interagency Transmission Authorization and Permits (CITAP) program, which aims to improve coordination across agencies, create efficiencies, and establish a standard two-year timeline for federal transmission authorizations and permits. The CITAP program gives transmission developers a new option for a more efficient review process, a major step to provide increased confidence for the sector to invest in new transmission lines.
 
DOE is also issuing a final rule to create an even faster track for completing environmental reviews of upgrades to existing transmission lines, which will increase reliability and lower energy costs. The rule creates a categorical exclusion, the simplest form of review under the National Environmental Policy Act, for projects that use existing transmission rights of way, such as reconductoring projects, as well as for solar and energy storage projects on already disturbed lands.
 
Additionally, today, the Administration is launching an effort to mobilize public and private sector leaders to expand the capacity of the existing U.S. transmission network, setting an ambition to upgrade 100,000 miles of transmission lines over the next five years. The Administration has made funding available through the Grid Resilience and Innovation Partnership (GRIP) program to support upgrades to existing transmission lines, and DOE’s categorical exclusion issued today will speed up the process to upgrade existing lines. The power sector can achieve this ambition primarily by deploying modern grid technologies like high-performance conductors and dynamic line ratings that enable existing transmission lines to carry more power. As a complement to building new lines, deploying solutions like these offer fast and cost-effective ways to unlock hundreds of gigawatts of additional clean energy, increase system reliability and resilience, reduce grid congestion, and cut energy costs.
 
These efforts all work in tandem – historic investments from President Biden’s Investing in America agenda that are making America a magnet for clean energy investment; continued permitting progress to get projects up and running; and smart standards to provide rules of the road for power companies, enabling them to seize the unprecedented opportunities to deliver clean electricity across the country. These steps – which are part of a broader slate of Earth Week announcements – build on President Biden’s actions since Day One to tackle the climate crisis and advance environmental justice.
 
Upgrading the Electric Grid for Reliability and Resilience
President Biden’s Investing in America agenda is delivering the largest investment in grid infrastructure in history—more than $30 billion from the Inflation Reduction Act and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. These investments will help deliver reliable, affordable electricity to families and businesses, prepare for worsening natural disasters that strain the grid, and unlock the economic and environmental benefits of clean energy. To help expand the transmission system at the pace necessary to confront the climate crisis, today’s actions and additional recent steps will help streamline permitting and overcome financial hurdles:
 

• Completing a New Transmission Line: Today the Department of the Interior (DOI) is celebrating the completion of the Ten West Link transmission line from Arizona to California. The line began transmitting electricity today and will increase reliability and unlock more than 3,200 megawatts of capacity from solar projects. DOI approved the construction of this project in 2022.
  
• Continuing to Invest in Grid Upgrades: Last week applications closed for up to $2.7 billion in DOE grant funding under the second round of the Grid Resilience and Innovation Partnerships (GRIP) program for projects to upgrade and modernize the transmission and distribution system to increase reliability and resilience. This builds upon $3.46 billion in projects selected for grid upgrades in October 2023, which are funded by President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.
  
• Charting the Future of the Grid to Meet Emerging Challenges: Last week DOE released the 2024 Future of Resource Adequacy Report to lay out solutions to meet increasing electricity demand while cutting emissions and maintaining affordability. DOE also released the Innovative Grid Deployment Liftoff Report to chart pathways to deployment of modern, commercially available transmission and distribution technologies that could support 20 to 100 gigawatts of peak demand.

Revitalizing U.S. Manufacturing and Securing Clean Energy Supply Chains
Thanks to incentives from President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act and Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the clean energy future will be made in America. Under the Biden-Harris Administration, private companies have invested almost $80 billion in clean energy manufacturing. Strengthening U.S. clean energy supply chains not only benefits American workers but also makes it easier to deploy clean energy even faster to cut emissions. Recent actions continue the progress to build and secure domestic supply chains and ensure that the U.S. will lead the world in clean energy manufacturing:

• Expanding U.S. Clean Energy Manufacturing and Creating Good-Paying Jobs: The Treasury Department and DOE recently announced $4 billion in Inflation Reduction Act tax credit allocations for over 100 manufacturing projects across 35 states under the Qualifying Advanced Energy Project Tax Credit (48C). This includes projects to manufacture transformers and grid components, electric vehicle components and chargers, and transmission cables, produce clean steel, and process critical minerals and materials. These allocations include $1.5 billion for projects in historic energy communities that have experienced closure of coal mines and power plants.
  
• Securing the U.S. Nuclear Fuel Supply Chain: Last week, DOE announced several milestones on the path to establish a domestic fuel supply chain for nuclear energy and reduce our reliance on imports. DOE recently closed the requests for proposal to purchase high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU) needed for advanced nuclear reactors, which is part of a $700 million program secured through the Inflation Reduction Act. Moreover, an enrichment plant (located in Piketon, Ohio) produced the first 100 kilograms of civilian HALEU ever in the United States with future plans to expand to 900 kilograms. U.S. capabilities will increase further thanks to an additional $2.7 billion made available from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law in the Fiscal Year 2024 Energy and Water Development, which, when paired with $2.2 billion from France and the United Kingdom meets and exceeds a commitment made last fall at COP28 to pool funds to develop a safe and secure global supply chain.

Deploying Clean Energy to Meet America’s Power Needs
The President’s Investing in America agenda has unleashed unprecedented investment in deployment of clean energy technologies, attracting hundreds of billions of dollars in private sector investment and creating over 270,000 new clean energy jobs. The Administration is taking additional steps to accelerate buildout of clean energy and remove roadblocks to deployment to ensure that new clean energy resources can come online fast to meet growing demand. Recent actions include:

• Accelerating Offshore Wind Deployment: Yesterday DOI announced plans for the next five years of offshore wind leasing, as well as a final rule to modernize offshore wind regulations. Over the next 20 years, the final rule is expected to result in cost savings of roughly $1.9 billion to the offshore renewable energy industry, savings that can be passed onto consumers or used to invest in additional job-creating clean energy projects.  Additionally, DOE released the Offshore Wind Liftoff Report, charting a path to success for the next wave of projects through continued innovation and cost reductions, along with DOE’s latest steps to support offshore wind manufacturing and transmission development.  Through these actions, the Biden-Harris Administration continues to support state leadership and use every tool available to responsibly grow an American offshore wind industry that will create thousands of good-paying jobs, including federal investments and approvals under President Biden’s leadership of 10 gigawatts of commercial-scale offshore wind projects, with the first two already providing power to the grid, as well as over 1 million acres newly leased to provide offshore wind opportunities for years ahead.
  
• Promoting Development of Renewable Energy on Public Lands: This month DOI issued a final rule to reduce fees for solar and wind projects on public lands by 80 percent and announced that DOI has now permitted more than 25 gigawatts of clean energy projects on public lands, surpassing a major milestone ahead of 2025.
  
• Speeding Up Process to Connect New Power Plants to the Grid: Last week DOE released the Transmission Interconnection Roadmap, a first-of-its-kind report laying out solutions to accelerate the process to connect clean energy projects to the grid and reduce wait times for new solar, wind, and battery projects. The Roadmap complements $10 million that DOE recently made available for analytical tools and other approaches to accelerate the interconnection process. Additionally, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission is moving forward to implement a series of major transmission reforms, including a final rule to streamline the interconnection process.
  
• Taking Advantage of Extensive Geothermal Energy Resources:  Last week DOI adopted categorical exclusions to expedite the review and approval of geothermal energy exploration on public lands. In addition, DOE recently released a new Pathways to Commercial Liftoff report on geothermal power, which showed how U.S. geothermal energy production could grow by a factor of 20 to 90 Gigawatts by 2050.
  
• Improving the State and Local Renewable Energy Siting Process: Last week DOE opened a funding opportunity for state-based collaboratives to build capacity to improve renewable energy planning and siting processes. This funding, supported by the Inflation Reduction Act, will accelerate the siting process to bring renewable energy online faster while improving outcomes for host communities, local governments, and disadvantaged communities.

Ensuring All Communities Benefit from Clean Energy
From Day One, President Biden has prioritized ensuring that all communities benefit from clean energy deployment, including the energy communities and workers that have powered our nation for generations and the low-income households that are burdened with high energy bills. The Administration has followed through on these commitments—not just talking about coal and power plant communities but investing in them. The President’s Investing in America agenda is creating good-paying and union jobs in energy communities, bringing solar energy to low-income households to reduce energy bills, supporting community engagement and improved outcomes for state and local permitting, and increasing grid reliability and resilience through distributed energy solutions. The President’s Justice40 Initiative sets a goal that 40% of the overall benefits of certain federal in climate, clean energy, and other investments flow to disadvantaged communities that have been marginalized by underinvestment and overburdened by pollution. Recent actions continue this progress:

• Reducing Energy Bills for Low-Income Households: This week the EPA announced $7 billion to deploy solar energy for low-income communities through the Solar for All program, funded by the Inflation Reduction Act. The 60 selections will provide funding to support 60 states, territories, Tribal governments, municipalities, and nonprofits to enable low-income and disadvantaged communities to benefit from solar, cutting annual electricity bills by more than $350 million for low-income households, creating an estimated 200,000 jobs, and increasing grid reliability.
  
• Deploying Clean Energy in Energy Communities: DOE recently announced up to $475 million for five projects in Arizona, Kentucky, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia to accelerate clean energy deployment on current and former mine lands. The projects, supported by President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, will deploy geothermal, pumped-storage hydropower, solar, and battery storage and will spur new economic opportunities in communities that have helped power the nation for generations.
  
• Building Opportunities for Coal and Power Plant Communities to Continue Powering America: DOE recently released an information guide and technical study for communities and stakeholders who are considering replacing their coal plants with nuclear. Coal-to-nuclear transition can significantly reduce the cost of nuclear plant construction, while creating new high-paying jobs, increasing community income and revenue, and improving public health. DOE’s study found that, with adequate planning and training support, most workers at an existing coal plant should be able to transition to work at a replacement nuclear plant.
  
• Building a National Network to Finance Local Clean Energy Projects: This month the EPA announced $20 billion in grant awards under two competitions from the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund to create a national network to fund tens of thousands of climate and clean energy projects across America, especially in communities historically left behind and overburdened by pollution. One selectee, the Green Bank for Rural America, will help bring clean energy to rural America and energy communities, with a particular focus on Appalachia, helping ensure that the communities that have powered the nation for a century do not get left behind in the energy transition.
  
• Funding Microgrids for Tribal Communities:  DOE recently announced a $72.8 million conditional commitment to fund a solar-plus-storage microgrid on the Tribal lands of the Viejas Band of the Kumeyaay Indians. This will reduce the cost of energy, power local commercial business, create 250 construction jobs prioritizing Tribal, minority and veteran-owned contractors, and enhance the Tribal energy sovereignty.
  
• Advancing Environmental Justice: Through the Justice40 Initiative, 518 programs across 19 federal agencies are being reimagined and transformed to ensure the benefits reach the communities that need them most. Federal agencies are making this happen with the Climate and Economic Justice Screening Tool, which is used to identify communities that benefit from the Justice40 Initiative.

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The post FACT SHEET: Biden-Harris Administration Announces Key Actions to Strengthen America’s Electric Grid, Boost Clean Energy Deployment and Manufacturing Jobs, and Cut Dangerous Pollution from the Power Sector appeared first on The White House.

Introduction

The President’s Investing in America agenda delivers historic public investments to American communities through legislation like the American Rescue Plan, Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the CHIPS and Science Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act. These investments are crowding-in private investment into critical industries—to date, private companies have announced $825 billion in investments in growing industries like semiconductors, clean energy, and electric vehicles—and creating hundreds of thousands of jobs.

Creation of high-quality jobs for American workers is central to the President’s economic growth agenda. Already, since President Biden took office, the economy has added 15 million jobs while the unemployment rate fell to its lowest level in half of a century, remaining below 4 percent for a record 26 months. But as the President’s agenda brings clean energy and manufacturing back to America after decades of offshoring, the Biden-Harris Administration recognizes that this transition won’t be fully achieved if we don’t build the workforce we need. Expanded commitments to workforce development are necessary to successfully create durable, lasting industries through the Investing in America agenda.

As described in the Administration’s Roadmap to Support Good Jobs, the Biden-Harris Administration’s workforce strategy has four central priorities. First, it is designed to connect people to good jobs, including through evidence-backed training solutions like registered apprenticeships and other high-quality “earn and learn” pathways, and supportive services like child care that expand opportunity for American workers. Second, it is focused on ensuring that we have a skilled, diverse workforce for our transformational investments, with targeted workforce programs that align with growing sectors like clean energy and manufacturing that President Biden’s agenda has focused on. Third it ensures every community can meet its foundational labor needs, with policies designed to support short- and long-term labor supply in critical sectors like health care and transportation that often struggle to recruit and retain talented workers. Fourth, it prioritizes the creation of good-paying jobs with benefits, safety, stability, and worker voice to ensure that American families and businesses thrive.

This blog provides additional detail on the economic context for the President’s workforce strategy along with, for each of these priorities, recent actions taken, and recent progress in enacting them. 

The economics of the President’s workforce strategy

President Biden took office in the midst of a global pandemic with staggering economic consequences. In January 2021, the unemployment rate was 6.4 percent and the labor force participation rate was 61.3 percent—two percentage points below the rate only a year earlier. However, the workforce problems did not begin with the 2020 pandemic. The United States had seen a multi-decade-long decline in the labor force participation rate for workers between the ages of 25 to 54, falling behind many of its peer countries. In manufacturing communities, the offshoring of domestic manufacturing in the 1990s and early 2000s led to the loss, by 2011, of one million U.S. manufacturing jobs and 2.4 million jobs overall.

President Biden came into office determined to address these challenges. His American Rescue Plan enabled the strongest recovery in decades. And moving forward, external estimates predict that over the next decade, the Administration’s Investing in America agenda will create more than a million jobs in industries like construction and manufacturing. In addition to making bold investments in 21st century infrastructure and industries, President Biden has an evidence-backed workforce strategy designed to ensure that all Americans have the opportunity to get a good, well-paid job in their community.

The Administration has made investments in evidence-backed training programs that ensure employers and counselors can play an active role in providing workers with the skills they actually need in industries with actual demand for labor. Research shows that demand-driven, sector-focused employment programs can not only increase employment in targeted sectors, but also have positive effects on earnings—especially for underserved workers entering these programs. These initiatives do not require students or workers to know on their own what skills the future job market requires. Instead, programs that produce the largest and most persistent earnings gains make strong connections to employers to determine in-demand jobs and skills. These programs also tend to provide larger investments per participant, upfront screening of participants on basic skills and motivation, and wraparound support services for participants.

Registered Apprenticeship programs have been shown to be particularly effective at increasing workers’ earning potential. A study of apprenticeships in 10 states finds that, over their lifetime, individuals who completed their training earned an average of $240,037 more than nonparticipants, with net social benefits of $49,000 over the course of the apprentice’s career. Apprenticeships also benefit employers; one study found that, on average, for every $1.00 invested, employers receive $1.44 in direct and indirect benefits in the years during and after training an apprentice.

The Biden-Harris Administration invests holistically in places across the United States, so that workers can get jobs in their communities. Job programs that are targeted towards regions that have been underinvested in can have particularly strong payoffs. One recent study found that the economic benefits of policies that add jobs in a given place (such as government-funded infrastructure projects) are at least 60 percent greater in “distressed” regions than in “booming” ones.

The President’s investments to empower and educate workers are already paying off. After Georgia received over $37 billion in private investments for clean energy technology, the city of Augusta has partnered with five major regional employers to develop their workforce and meet this increased demand through an Investing in America Workforce Hub. Terrence Tillman, a recent graduate of a newly expanded apprenticeship program, said “This is going to change my lifestyle. […] Knowing what the job entails and what its purpose is, I feel like I’m helping the country and the community.” Augusta is emblematic of how the Investing in America agenda can deliver good paying jobs and prepare the workforce for the future.

The President’s workforce strategy prioritizes job quality. An extensive economic literature lays out the benefits of improved job quality for workers, households, and businesses. By improving job quality, employers can more easily attract and retain workers—benefitting their bottom line. At the same time, improved job quality enables workers to bring home the pay and benefits that provide an opportunity to reach the middle class, which in turn supports economic growth.

Paying workers fair wages and providing benefits like paid leave can increase productivity, reduce turnover, and facilitate hiring and retention. Providing childcare lowers turnover while increasing the likelihood that parents can invest in training or additional education and work (especially full-time). Manufacturing firms that focus on job quality, like increasing pay and providing avenues for workers to have inputs into the firms’ practices, are better able to attract skilled workers, experience lower turnover, and generate higher productivity. Similarly, unions are already playing a central role in developing and training the workforce for the President’s investments in America.

Conclusion

President Biden has prioritized the creation of high-quality jobs for American workers in two ways—a strong and rapid labor market recovery and a comprehensive workforce strategy that prepares workers for the 21st century economy. As a result, while forecasters predicted that in 2023 the economy would fall into a recession, the US economy grew at a healthy 3.4 percent in the fourth quarter of 2023, added over 15 million jobs, saw the unemployment rate fall below 4 percent for a record 26 months, and hit a record low gap between the highest and lowest state unemployment rates. Further, employment growth remains solid in specific industries where growth has been catalyzed by the Investing in America agenda—since January 2021, the economy has added 848,000 jobs in construction, 768,000 jobs in manufacturing, and 27,500 jobs in clean energy employment.

The Biden-Harris Administration is committed to making the necessary investments to connect Americans to good jobs, prepare them for our transformation investments, ensure every community can meet its foundational labor needs, and boost job quality. Case in point: President Biden’s FY25 Budget proposes a new $8 billion Career Training Fund that would provide approximately 750,000 workers with training and wrap-around supports, as well as funds to expand public-private partnerships to offer high-quality training in growing industries. Investments like these lay the foundation for a thriving U.S. economy and strong, shared, and stable economic growth.

The post Following Up on the Four Priorities of President Biden’s Workforce Strategy appeared first on The White House.

Today, the White House convened state legislative leaders to discuss state-level actions to address junk fees, building on the Biden-Harris Administration’s unprecedented efforts to crack down on junk fees across the economy to lower costs for Americans. National Economic Advisor Lael Brainard, Domestic Policy Advisor Neera Tanden, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) Director Rohit Chopra, Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chair Lina Khan, Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont, and state legislators from across the country participated.

President Biden is committed to taking on hidden junk fees that companies sneak onto customer bills, and which the Council of Economic Advisers estimates amount to more than $90 billion every year. These fees occur across industries, from apartment rentals to concert tickets to health insurance. Since the first White House State Convening on Combatting Junk Fees last March, the Administration has taken landmark actions to increase transparency and eliminate these fees, including:

• The CFPB finalized a rule capping credit card late fees at $8, saving the 45 million Americans who are charged these fees an average of $220 per year and $10 billion overall. In January 2024, the agency proposed rules that would bring overdraft fees down to as low as $3 and prohibit non-sufficient funds fees on transactions declined right at the swipe, tap, or click.  These actions build upon more than $6.1 billion in annual savings in reduced and eliminated overdraft and non-sufficient funds fees as a result of the CFPB’s work.  Since the CFPB heightened its supervisory attention on overdraft and NSF fees in 2022, financial institutions have agreed to refund over $240 million to consumers
  
• The FTC proposed a rule that would prohibit companies from charging hidden and misleading fees and require that they display the full-price up front, and finalized a rule to ban hidden junk fees and bait-and-switch fees in car buying.
  
• Today, the Department of Transportation finalized rules that would require airlines to clearly disclose baggage fees, change fees, and cancellation fees up front, and require airlines to refund for flight cancellations or significant delays.
  
• The Federal Communication Commission finalized a rule requiring that cable and satellite TV providers provide consumers with the “all-in” price for video programming services. In the same month, the agency proposed a rule that would ban bulk billing arrangements by internet, cable, and satellite service providers. In addition, the FCC has proposed rules to ban early termination fees for cable and TV satellite provides, and as of this month, large internet providers are required to display labels at the point of sale for internet services that show the prices, fees, speeds, and other critical information under a new FCC rulemaking, so that consumers know what they are paying for up front.
  
• Last month, the Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor, and Treasury finalized rules to combat “junk health insurance” plans that deceive Americans into believing they have comprehensive coverage while leaving them on the hook for thousands of dollars in medical bills. Under the new rules, health insurance companies now have to provide consumers with a clear disclaimer explaining the limits of the services they cover and how much they cover.

Actions taken by the Administration will save Americans over $20 billion per year on junk fees, according to the Council of Economic Advisers. While the President is committed to using every tool at his disposal to combat unfair and deceptive pricing, he also believes that state-level actions are an essential part of this mission. This legislative year, at least 12 states introduced legislation to curb junk fees and during the convening state leaders shared steps they are taking to address junk fees in their home states. Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont has introduced sweeping price transparency legislation this session and called on the General Assembly to bring it to a vote last month. Legislators in Arizona, Minnesota, New York, Pennsylvania, and Illinois have introduced far-reaching legislation to combat hidden and misleading fees, and many discussed progress in advancing legislation and the strong support from constituents to tackle these issues. These bills combat junk fees across multiple industries, protecting consumers in every corner of the economy. White House officials thanked the state leaders for their work and ongoing partnership on behalf of American families.

The White House State Legislative Convening on Combatting Junk Fees can be viewed here.

The following state elected officials delivered remarks as part of the convening:

• Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont
• New York Senate Deputy Leader Michael Gianaris|
• Minnesota Representative Emma Greenman
• Illinois Representative Bob Morgan
• Arizona Representative Analise Ortiz
• Pennsylvania Representative Nick Pisciottano

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The post Readout of White House State Legislators Convening on Junk Fees appeared first on The White House.

Today, the White House convened state legislative leaders to discuss state-level actions to address junk fees, building on the Biden-Harris Administration’s unprecedented efforts to crack down on junk fees across the economy to lower costs for Americans. National Economic Advisor Lael Brainard, Domestic Policy Advisor Neera Tanden, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) Director Rohit Chopra, Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chair Lina Khan, Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont, and state legislators from across the country participated.

President Biden is committed to taking on hidden junk fees that companies sneak onto customer bills, and which the Council of Economic Advisers estimates amount to more than $90 billion every year. These fees occur across industries, from apartment rentals to concert tickets to health insurance. Since the first White House State Convening on Combatting Junk Fees last March, the Administration has taken landmark actions to increase transparency and eliminate these fees, including:

• The CFPB finalized a rule capping credit card late fees at $8, saving the 45 million Americans who are charged these fees an average of $220 per year and $10 billion overall. In January 2024, the agency proposed rules that would bring overdraft fees down to as low as $3 and prohibit non-sufficient funds fees on transactions declined right at the swipe, tap, or click.  These actions build upon more than $6.1 billion in annual savings in reduced and eliminated overdraft and non-sufficient funds fees as a result of the CFPB’s work.  Since the CFPB heightened its supervisory attention on overdraft and NSF fees in 2022, financial institutions have agreed to refund over $240 million to consumers
  
• The FTC proposed a rule that would prohibit companies from charging hidden and misleading fees and require that they display the full-price up front, and finalized a rule to ban hidden junk fees and bait-and-switch fees in car buying.
  
• Today, the Department of Transportation finalized rules that would require airlines to clearly disclose baggage fees, change fees, and cancellation fees up front, and require airlines to refund for flight cancellations or significant delays.
  
• The Federal Communication Commission finalized a rule requiring that cable and satellite TV providers provide consumers with the “all-in” price for video programming services. In the same month, the agency proposed a rule that would ban bulk billing arrangements by internet, cable, and satellite service providers. In addition, the FCC has proposed rules to ban early termination fees for cable and TV satellite provides, and as of this month, large internet providers are required to display labels at the point of sale for internet services that show the prices, fees, speeds, and other critical information under a new FCC rulemaking, so that consumers know what they are paying for up front.
  
• Last month, the Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor, and Treasury finalized rules to combat “junk health insurance” plans that deceive Americans into believing they have comprehensive coverage while leaving them on the hook for thousands of dollars in medical bills. Under the new rules, health insurance companies now have to provide consumers with a clear disclaimer explaining the limits of the services they cover and how much they cover.

Actions taken by the Administration will save Americans over $20 billion per year on junk fees, according to the Council of Economic Advisers. While the President is committed to using every tool at his disposal to combat unfair and deceptive pricing, he also believes that state-level actions are an essential part of this mission. This legislative year, at least 12 states introduced legislation to curb junk fees and during the convening state leaders shared steps they are taking to address junk fees in their home states. Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont has introduced sweeping price transparency legislation this session and called on the General Assembly to bring it to a vote last month. Legislators in Arizona, Minnesota, New York, Pennsylvania, and Illinois have introduced far-reaching legislation to combat hidden and misleading fees, and many discussed progress in advancing legislation and the strong support from constituents to tackle these issues. These bills combat junk fees across multiple industries, protecting consumers in every corner of the economy. White House officials thanked the state leaders for their work and ongoing partnership on behalf of American families.

The White House State Legislative Convening on Combatting Junk Fees can be viewed here.

The following state elected officials delivered remarks as part of the convening:

• Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont
• New York Senate Deputy Leader Michael Gianaris|
• Minnesota Representative Emma Greenman
• Illinois Representative Bob Morgan
• Arizona Representative Analise Ortiz
• Pennsylvania Representative Nick Pisciottano

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The post Readout of White House State Legislators Convening on Junk Fees appeared first on The White House.

On Wednesday, April 24, 2024, the President signed into law:
 
H.R. 4389, the “Migratory Birds of the Americas Conservation Enhancements Act of 2023,” which reauthorizes and amends the Neotropical Migratory Bird Conservation.

Thank you to Representatives Salazar, Larsen, Peltola and Joyce, and Senators Cardin and Boozman, for their leadership.

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The post Bill Signed: H.R. 4389 appeared first on The White House.

On Wednesday, April 24, 2024, the President signed into law:
 
H.R. 4389, the “Migratory Birds of the Americas Conservation Enhancements Act of 2023,” which reauthorizes and amends the Neotropical Migratory Bird Conservation.

Thank you to Representatives Salazar, Larsen, Peltola and Joyce, and Senators Cardin and Boozman, for their leadership.

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The post Bill Signed: H.R. 4389 appeared first on The White House.

Today, Russia vetoed a UN Security Council resolution, proposed jointly by the United States and Japan, that would have reaffirmed the fundamental obligation of States Parties to the Outer Space Treaty not to place nuclear weapons in orbit around the Earth. The resolution also would have called on all Member States not to develop nuclear weapons specifically designed to be placed in orbit. Placement by a State Party of a nuclear weapon in orbit would not only violate the Outer Space Treaty, but would threaten the vital communications, scientific, meteorological, agricultural, commercial, and national security services that any and all satellites provide to societies around the globe. As we have noted previously, the United States assesses that Russia is developing a new satellite carrying a nuclear device. We have heard President Putin say publicly that Russia has no intention of deploying nuclear weapons in space. If that were the case, Russia would not have vetoed this resolution.

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The post Statement from National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan on Russia’s Veto of the UN Security Council Resolution on the Outer Space Treaty appeared first on The White House.

Today, Russia vetoed a UN Security Council resolution, proposed jointly by the United States and Japan, that would have reaffirmed the fundamental obligation of States Parties to the Outer Space Treaty not to place nuclear weapons in orbit around the Earth. The resolution also would have called on all Member States not to develop nuclear weapons specifically designed to be placed in orbit. Placement by a State Party of a nuclear weapon in orbit would not only violate the Outer Space Treaty, but would threaten the vital communications, scientific, meteorological, agricultural, commercial, and national security services that any and all satellites provide to societies around the globe. As we have noted previously, the United States assesses that Russia is developing a new satellite carrying a nuclear device. We have heard President Putin say publicly that Russia has no intention of deploying nuclear weapons in space. If that were the case, Russia would not have vetoed this resolution.

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The post Statement from National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan on Russia’s Veto of the UN Security Council Resolution on the Outer Space Treaty appeared first on The White House.

Washington Hilton Hotel
Washington, D.C.

12:40 P.M. EDT

THE PRESIDENT:  Whoa!  Holy mackerel.  (Applause.)  Whoa!  (Applause.)  Hello, hello, hello!  (Applause.)

AUDIENCE:  Four more years!  Four more years!  Four more years!

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you, thank you, thank you. 

AUDIENCE:  Four more years!  Four more years!  Four more years!

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you.

AUDIENCE:  Four more years!  Four more years!  Four more years!

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you, thank you, thank you. 

AUDIENCE:  Four more years!  Four more years!  Four more years!

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you.

AUDIENCE:  Four more years!  Four more years!  Four more years!

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you, thank you, thank you.  Please have a seat.  Whoa!  (Applause.)

Whoa!  What a welcome.  I’m going home.  (Laughter.)

Thank you, thank you, thank you, Building Trades.  God love you all.  (Applause.)  No, I really mean it.

And Shawn, thank you for your friendship, your partnership.  And it’s been an incredible honor — and I mean this from the bottom of my heart — an incredible honor to be endorsed by the Building Trades.  (Applause.)  I mean it.  You’re the best.

Not a joke.  It’s not a joke.  You’re the best in the world.  That’s not a joke.  You’re the best in the world.  You know, you had my back in 2020.  And because of you, I’m standing here as President of the United States of America — because of you.  (Applause.)  And that’s a fact. 

Because you, in 2024, we’re going to make Donald Trump a loser again.  (Applause.)  Are you ready?  Are you ready?  (Applause.)

I’m so damn proud to be with you.  And I really mean it: I’m proud to be with you.  All my — my relatives, my grandpop and everybody else up in — were — they’re all gone now, but in Scranton, they — my — I had an uncle who used to say, “Joey, you’re belt buckle to shoe shole [sole] union.”

Well, let me tell you something.  I’m proud to be the most union pres- — pro-union president in American history.  And it’s because of you.  You’re proof what have — I’ve always known.  Not a joke. 

I’ve always known that Wall Street didn’t build America.  The middle class built America, and unions built the middle class.  (Applause.)  That’s a fact.  That’s a fact.

Folks, being with you today reminds me of where I grew up in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and Claymont, Delaware.  I was up in Scranton last week. 

It’s great to have the mayor of Scranton, by the way, Paige Cognetti.  Where are you, Paige?  She’s here today.  I don’t — it’s a big crowd out there, but you’ll — if you see her, you’ll know her.  (Laughter.)

Look, in Scranton, I learned a basic value set that all of you learned as well, no matter where you’re from.  I learned that money doesn’t determine your worth.  I learned that all anyone wants is just a fair shot — a fair shot of making it.  Don’t block the road for me.  Give me an even shot. 

My dad, I swear to God, used to have an expression.  He’d come home from — after he closed — he’d come for dinner and then go back and close his — the shop.  My dad would say, “Joey a job” — and I mean it sincerely — “a job is about a lot more than a paycheck.  It’s about your dignity.  It’s about respect.  It’s about being able to look your child in the eye and say, ‘Honey, it’s going to be okay’ and mean it.”

That’s what we’re all about: dignity of all workers — the dignity of workers.  (Applause.)  I mean it.

And we all grew up — (applause) — we all grew up with folks who sort of looked down on us because of what our dads did.  They weren’t in business.  They weren’t executives.  They weren’t something special.  But they are special. 

You know, but people like Donald Trump learned a different lesson.  He learned the best way to get rich is inherit it.  (Laughter.)  He learned that paying taxes is something working people did, not him.  He learned that telling people “you’re fired” was something to laugh about.

Not in my household.  Not in my neighborhood.  (Applause.)  I mean it sincerely.  No joke.  Especially being fired because you had no protection. 

Folks, I guess that’s how you look at the world from Mar-a-Lago, where Trump and his rich friends embrace the same failed trickle-down policies that have failed working-class families and union families for over 40 years.

But if you grew up where we grew up, nobody handed you anything.  Being told you were fired wasn’t entertainment.  It was devastating.  It was a nightmare.

And, folks, we all know people like Trump who look down on us, don’t we?  We all know somebody we grew up with like that.

Well, folks, where I come from, it matters.  When I look at the economy, I don’t see it through the eyes of Mar-a-Lago, I see it through the eyes of — through the eyes of Scranton and working people like all of you and my family.

You know, we know the best way to grow an economy is from the bottom up and the middle out, not the top down.  My dad used to say not a whole hell of a lot trickled down on his kitchen table in that top-down policy.

When we do that, when we work from the bottom up and the middle out, the poor have a ladder up and the middle class does well.

And, by the way, the wealthy still do very well if they just start paying their damn taxes.  (Applause.)

So, it’s either Scranton values or Mar-a-Lago values.  These are competing visions of the economy at the heart of this election — competing visions of what we look at and see as Amer- — as America.

Folks, one of the reasons I ran for President was to rebuild the backbone of the middle class, and we have.  We’re following my blue-collar blueprint to rebuild America.  And guess what?  It’s working. 

You’re building that America.  You’re — in this room — are building that America.

For example, thanks to my Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, more than 51,000 new manufacturing projects have been announced so far, and we’re just beginning.  It’s just beginning.  (Applause.)  It’s just — just starting.  (Applause.)

Roads, bridges, ports, airports, clean water systems, available high-speed Internet all across America and built by the Building Trades.  (Applause.)

Remember when President Pr- — Trump promised us — (laughs) — I’ve got to be careful.  (Laughter.)

AUDIENCE MEMBER:  Say it!  Say it!

THE PRESIDENT:  He promised us “Infrastructure Week.”  Well, I tell you what, it took four years; he never built a damn thing.  Nothing.  I’m serious.  (Applause.)  Are you surprised?

I’m sure — I’m making sure the projects, like project labor agreements, so highly skilled workers have a voice on the job. 

But even before Trump was president, Trump preferred non-union workers in his real estate projects.  And I don’t want to get into the stories.  But anyway.  Even he — even in that he didn’t keep his word.  He just asked contractors, vendors, and small businesses.  And — and if you read the press, if any of it’s true, he never paid them — a whole hell a lot of them.  The guy has never worked a day in a working man’s boots. 

By the way, he gave me a pair of boots as a gift, by the way.  (Laughter.)  I know how to put them on.  I still sometimes cut the yard.  The Secret Service doesn’t let me do it anymore.  (Laughter.)

Folks, I’m making Davis-Bacon requirements stronger to guarantee prevailing wage.  (Applause.) 

By the way, we’re making them stronger.  (Applause.)  That will — (applause) — that alone will increase wages for more than a million construction workers. 

Trump’s MAGA allies are trying to take it away now.  But it’s not going to happen on my watch.  (Applause.)

Since — since the 1930s, the law has said when the federal government spends taxpayers’ dollars on a project, it can only buy American products to do it and use American workers to get it done.  That’s “Buy America.”  Donald Trump failed to uphold that.  But not anymore.  My administration uses American products and American workers.  That’s why it’s going.  (Applause.)  I mean it.

Because, folks — (applause) — it’s — it’s not a joke.  It’s not a campaign line.  The God’s truth is you’re the best workers in the world.  That’s a fact.  You’re the best workers in the world. 

When I went out to South Korea to get them to beg- — start to build back those computer chips here in America, I said, “Why are you wil-” — and they decided to do it, invest- — investing billions of dollars.  I said, “Why are you doing it?”  He said, “Two things: You have the best workers in the world, and you have the safest place in the world to do it.”

Well, folks, when I think climate, I think jobs.  I think union jobs — good-paying jobs that don’t require a college degree. 

You’ve attracted nearly $700 billion in private-sector investment in advanced manufacturing, in semiconductors, clean energy, and so much more here in America, creating tens of thousands of good-paying jobs, Building Trades jobs.  In fact, construction of new factories has more than doubled in our administration.

Meanwhile — (applause) — meanwhile, Donald Trump still thinks windmills cause cancer.  (Laughter.)  That’s what he said. 

And, by the way, remember when he was trying to deal with COVID?  He said just inject a little bleach in your veins.  (Laughter.)  He missed; it all went to his hair.  (Laughter.)

Look, I shouldn’t have said that.  (Applause.)  I probably shouldn’t have said that.  (Laughter.)  You guys are a bad influence on me.  (Laughter.)

Trump and his MAGA allies want to repeal the most significant investments in climate ever — the work that — that you risked your lives doing lots of it.  You know, it — and he wants to risk all those jobs.  Are you surprised?  I’m not.

A lot of you don’t know that if you want to be a pipe fitter — a lot of people don’t know — if you want to be a pipe fitter or an electrician or any of the other trades here, it takes four or five years of hard work as an apprentice.

Most people think you can walk up (inaudible) — you guys should talk more about this.  They think you can walk up and you just say, “I want to be an electrician,” and you get a license.  It’s four or five years.  It’s like going back to college.  It’s going — like getting a college degree.

And that’s the reason — the reason you’re the best is because you’re the best trained in the world.  You get it; I get it.  But Donald Trump has no clue.

He undermined union apprenticeships by lowering standards and lowering pay.  He ended — I ended his anti-work policy to save the building trades apprenticeships program because they’re the gold standard of the world.  (Applause.)  They are.  They actually are.

And, look — and earlier this week — earlier this week, I teamed up together to recruit young people into the building trades.  It’s — my American Climate Corps will now pa- — pave a pathway to your apprenticeship program, because it matters.  It matters.

Through my American Rescue Plan, there’s — not a single Republican voted for, I might add — I also enacted the Butch Lewis Act — (applause) — the most pro-labor law in 50 years, because of you — because of you.  That one act — that one act has already protected hard-earned pensions of over 1 million workers and retirees and counting. 

We made that happen.  While Trump promised it, he never even lifted a finger to try to get it.  Are you surprised? 

AUDIENCE:  No!

THE PRESIDENT:  I — hell no, I’m not, either.  (Laughter.) 

Trump put union busters on the Nabor La- — the National Labor Relations Board throughout his administration.  I’ve appointed people in my administration that actually care about American workers, like former bui- — the building trades leader, Marty Walsh, who was a great Labor Secretary — (applause) — during my administration.  

By the way, if you ever need — if you’re ever in a foxhole, I tell you, you want Marty Walsh — (pronounced in an accent) — with you, man.  (Laughter.)  Oh, you think I’m kidding.  He’s the real deal.

You know, I’ve walked proudly on union picket lines, while at the same time, Trump bashed unions from non-union shops.  (Applause.)  Are you surprised?

AUDIENCE:  No!

THE PRESIDENT:  Look, I want to sign the PRO Act into law.  (Applause.) 

Trump said he’d veto it.  Trump said he’d veto it.  Beyond that, he supports a National Right to Work law, for God’s sake.

AUDIENCE:  Booo —

THE PRESIDENT:  No, I — think about it.  What is the single biggest killer that could happen?  A National Right to Work law. 

Look, he might as well say he doesn’t support any unions.

Are we going to let him — that happen, pal?  We’re not going to let that happen.

AUDIENCE:  No!

THE PRESIDENT:  Let me ask you: Does anyone here think the tax system is fair?  Raise your hand. 

Well, Trump is proud of his $2 trillion tax cut in his administration that overwhelmingly benefited the very wealthy and the biggest corporations while exploding the federal debt.  Trump added more to the national debt than any president in a single term in all of American history — to the national debt. 

I cut the national debt so far — (applause) — and still got all those other things did by doing simple things like, you know — remember those 40 Fortune 500 company — or those — those Fortune 500 companies, 40 of them — I think, no, it was 50 — who didn’t pay a single penny in taxes and made 40 billion dol- — 4 billion — $40 billion? 

Well, guess what?  I did a terrible thing.  I made them pay 15 percent.  (Laughter and applause.)  And we cut the deficit by $70 billion. 

Look, now Trump is saying if he gets elected, he wants to give another — by the way, that tax credit of his expires next year.  Okay?  (Applause.) 

Well, let me tell you something: It’s going to stay expired and dead forever if I’m reelected.  But anyway.  (Applause.)

He wants another — he wants to give another massive tax cut for the wealthy.  And he also says he wants to cut your Medicare and Social Security, and you’re going to let him — that happen? 

AUDIENCE:  Booo —

THE PRESIDENT:  No, he — by —

AUDIENCE:  Booo —

THE PRESIDENT:  By the way, these — these guys mean this stuff.  They mean it.  And the Republican caucus went ahead and said they want to do that too.

Look, folks, I remember there used to be two parties — real parties, you know.  But this ain’t your father’s Republican Party.  This is a different breed of cat.

Look, I got a better idea.  I’m going to protect Social Security and Medicare by making the very wealthy begin to pay their fair share of the — (applause) —

No billionaire — (applause) — look — look, guys — no billionaire — and there’s a thousand of them in America — a thousand billionaires — no billionaire should pay less in taxes than a teacher, a nurse, a construction worker, a police officer. 

Guess what?  You know what their average — average tax rate for a billionaire in America is?  8.3 percent.  That’s what they pay.  

AUDIENCE:  Booo —

THE PRESIDENT:  I’m serious.  I’m serious.  

Look, if we just charge them 24 percent in their tax, which isn’t the highest tax rate, we’d generate fi- — fifty- — $500 billion over the next 10 years, allow us to significantly cut the deficit, allow us to move all — have daycare.  Allo- — allow us to do so many things to make the country stronger.  

I want to point out one thing.  It’s a little off point, but I wanted you to remember it.  I asked the Treasury Department, because I was getting all this compliment and, from some, criticism about being so pro-union — I said, “What happens to wages generally when unions have to get paid a decent salary?”  Everybody’s salaries goes up.  Everybody.  (Applause.)  You grow the economy.  You grow the economy.  You grow the economy.  

Look, the bottom line is we’re doing what’s always worked best in this country: investing in all of America and all Americans.  

Our plan is working.  So far, we’ve created over 15 million new jobs, including 848,000 construction jobs for a record 8.2 million across the construction industry.

Folks — (applause) — and, by the way, did you know there are only two presidents in American history who left office with fewer American jobs than they entered it: Herbert Hoover and, yes, Donald “Herbert Hoover” Trump.  (Laughter and applause.)  Only two.  (Applause.)

Look, folks — folks, we’re moving again.  We’re moving again as a country.  We’re beginning to gain momentum.  We have the best economy in the world, but we got a lot more to do.  But we’re moving again because you guys and women.  I mean — I’m not being solicitous.  That’s why we’re moving.  We’re building again.  And we’re just getting started.  

Let me close with this.  As I travel the country, I see the amazing things you’re doing — I mean it, all over the country, in red states and blue states.  

And this past June, I was in Philadelphia, Sean’s hometown.  And I married a Philly girl.  You don’t screw around with Philly people.  (Laughter.)  

If I didn’t vote for every Phi- — root for every Philly team out there, I’d be sleeping alone.  (Laughter.)  You all think I’m kidding.  (Laughter.)  

Look, remember when that tanker truck crashed and closed the key stretch of I-95 in Philly?  It was expected, like in the last administration, it would take months and months for anything to happen.  

Well, 150,000 vehicles travel that overpass every single day.  So, what did we do?  We contacted all of you.  We organized.  You organized.  We rebuilt that.  You rebuilt that in less than two weeks, record time.  How?  Because you’re the building trades — laborers, operating engineers, cement finishers, plumbers, pipe fitters, steelworkers.  (Applause.)  So many union workers.  (Applause.)

You showed up — you showed up around the clock.  (Applause.)  And you got it done.  (Applause.)

By the way, that’s America.  

By the way, unions are more popular today than they’ve ever been in a long, long time, not because of Joe Biden supporting them — because of you.  You always step up.  You step into the breach.  You get things done.  

That’s the union movement.  That’s what it’s about.

In Baltimore, we’re moving heaven and earth — or as my dad, from Baltimore, would say, Baltimore ¬– Baltimore.  (Pronounced in an accent.)  

We’re moving heaven and earth to rebuild the F- — the Francis Scott Key Bridge after its tragic collapse, and we’re doing it with you — with union labor and American steel — (applause) — and American steel.

That’s America.  That’s the union movement.  (Applause.)

Look, folks, I mean you’re doing — you ought to see — I mean, I’ve been to the site.  It’s incredible.  I’ve been over that bridge a lot.  I mean, I commuted every day for 36 years as a U.S. senator, when my wife and daughter were killed and I used to commute back and forth to be with my boys.  And I’ve over that — that area in Baltimore Harbor.  You — it’s incredible what you’re doing.  

And, folks, the choice is clear.  Donald Trump’s vision of America is one of revenge and retribution.  A defeated former president who sees the world from Mar-a-Lago and bows down to billionaires, who looks down on American union workers.  It’s not just he’s not supporting; he looks down on us.  

I — no, I’m not joking.  Think about it.  Think about the guys you grew up with who you’d like to get into the corner and just give them a straight left.  (Laughter.)  I’m not suggesting we hit the president.  (Laughter.)  But we all know those guys growing up.  We all know guys like that growing up.  

My vision of America is one of hope and opportunity — the view from Scranton and working-class Americans like you.  

Here’s the future I see, and I mean this from the bottom of my heart.  I’ve never been more optimistic about America’s chances, not because I’m President, because of the state of the moment.  The world needs us.

Look at we — I just signed — we just signed the bill to give support to Ukraine.  We — (applause) — we rebuilt NATO.  (Applause.)  We increased it. 

Like it or not, we’re the leading country in the world.  The rest of the world looks to us.  

I see an America where we defend democracy, not diminish it.  I see an America where we protect freedoms, not take them away.  I see an economy that grows from the middle out and the bottom up, where the wealthy pay their fair share so we can have childcare, paid leave, and so much more, and still reduce the federal deficit and increase economic growth.  

Folks, imagine what we can do next.  Four —

AUDIENCE MEMBER:  (Inaudible.) 

THE PRESIDENT:  — more years (inaudible). 

AUDIENCE:  Four more years!  Four more years!  Four more years!

THE PRESIDENT:  Are you ready?

AUDIENCE:  Four more years!  Four more years!  Four more years!

THE PRESIDENT:  Are you ready to move forward?

AUDIENCE:  Four more years!  Four more years!  Four more years!

THE PRESIDENT:  Well, thank you.  We’re all ready.  We’re ready to move forward not back.  

Are we ready to choose unity over division, dignity over hate, truth over lies? 

Are you ready to choose freedom over democ- — for democracy?  (Applause.) 

We can do this.  I give you my word as a Biden, I’ve never been more optimistic about our future in my entire career.  

We just have to remember who we are.  And I mean this.  Think about it.  We are the United States of America, and there’s nothing beyond our capacity — nothing, nothing, nothing — when we do it together.  (Applause.)  We got to do it together.  

God bless you all.  God bless you all.  And may God protect our troops.  Thank you, thank you, thank you.  (Applause.) 

Thank you all.  I don’t want to go.  (Applause.) 

1:05 P.M. EDT 

The post Remarks by President Biden at the North America’s Building Trades Unions National Legislative Conference appeared first on The White House.

Washington Hilton Hotel
Washington, D.C.

12:40 P.M. EDT

THE PRESIDENT:  Whoa!  Holy mackerel.  (Applause.)  Whoa!  (Applause.)  Hello, hello, hello!  (Applause.)

AUDIENCE:  Four more years!  Four more years!  Four more years!

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you, thank you, thank you. 

AUDIENCE:  Four more years!  Four more years!  Four more years!

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you.

AUDIENCE:  Four more years!  Four more years!  Four more years!

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you, thank you, thank you. 

AUDIENCE:  Four more years!  Four more years!  Four more years!

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you.

AUDIENCE:  Four more years!  Four more years!  Four more years!

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you, thank you, thank you.  Please have a seat.  Whoa!  (Applause.)

Whoa!  What a welcome.  I’m going home.  (Laughter.)

Thank you, thank you, thank you, Building Trades.  God love you all.  (Applause.)  No, I really mean it.

And Shawn, thank you for your friendship, your partnership.  And it’s been an incredible honor — and I mean this from the bottom of my heart — an incredible honor to be endorsed by the Building Trades.  (Applause.)  I mean it.  You’re the best.

Not a joke.  It’s not a joke.  You’re the best in the world.  That’s not a joke.  You’re the best in the world.  You know, you had my back in 2020.  And because of you, I’m standing here as President of the United States of America — because of you.  (Applause.)  And that’s a fact. 

Because you, in 2024, we’re going to make Donald Trump a loser again.  (Applause.)  Are you ready?  Are you ready?  (Applause.)

I’m so damn proud to be with you.  And I really mean it: I’m proud to be with you.  All my — my relatives, my grandpop and everybody else up in — were — they’re all gone now, but in Scranton, they — my — I had an uncle who used to say, “Joey, you’re belt buckle to shoe shole [sole] union.”

Well, let me tell you something.  I’m proud to be the most union pres- — pro-union president in American history.  And it’s because of you.  You’re proof what have — I’ve always known.  Not a joke. 

I’ve always known that Wall Street didn’t build America.  The middle class built America, and unions built the middle class.  (Applause.)  That’s a fact.  That’s a fact.

Folks, being with you today reminds me of where I grew up in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and Claymont, Delaware.  I was up in Scranton last week. 

It’s great to have the mayor of Scranton, by the way, Paige Cognetti.  Where are you, Paige?  She’s here today.  I don’t — it’s a big crowd out there, but you’ll — if you see her, you’ll know her.  (Laughter.)

Look, in Scranton, I learned a basic value set that all of you learned as well, no matter where you’re from.  I learned that money doesn’t determine your worth.  I learned that all anyone wants is just a fair shot — a fair shot of making it.  Don’t block the road for me.  Give me an even shot. 

My dad, I swear to God, used to have an expression.  He’d come home from — after he closed — he’d come for dinner and then go back and close his — the shop.  My dad would say, “Joey a job” — and I mean it sincerely — “a job is about a lot more than a paycheck.  It’s about your dignity.  It’s about respect.  It’s about being able to look your child in the eye and say, ‘Honey, it’s going to be okay’ and mean it.”

That’s what we’re all about: dignity of all workers — the dignity of workers.  (Applause.)  I mean it.

And we all grew up — (applause) — we all grew up with folks who sort of looked down on us because of what our dads did.  They weren’t in business.  They weren’t executives.  They weren’t something special.  But they are special. 

You know, but people like Donald Trump learned a different lesson.  He learned the best way to get rich is inherit it.  (Laughter.)  He learned that paying taxes is something working people did, not him.  He learned that telling people “you’re fired” was something to laugh about.

Not in my household.  Not in my neighborhood.  (Applause.)  I mean it sincerely.  No joke.  Especially being fired because you had no protection. 

Folks, I guess that’s how you look at the world from Mar-a-Lago, where Trump and his rich friends embrace the same failed trickle-down policies that have failed working-class families and union families for over 40 years.

But if you grew up where we grew up, nobody handed you anything.  Being told you were fired wasn’t entertainment.  It was devastating.  It was a nightmare.

And, folks, we all know people like Trump who look down on us, don’t we?  We all know somebody we grew up with like that.

Well, folks, where I come from, it matters.  When I look at the economy, I don’t see it through the eyes of Mar-a-Lago, I see it through the eyes of — through the eyes of Scranton and working people like all of you and my family.

You know, we know the best way to grow an economy is from the bottom up and the middle out, not the top down.  My dad used to say not a whole hell of a lot trickled down on his kitchen table in that top-down policy.

When we do that, when we work from the bottom up and the middle out, the poor have a ladder up and the middle class does well.

And, by the way, the wealthy still do very well if they just start paying their damn taxes.  (Applause.)

So, it’s either Scranton values or Mar-a-Lago values.  These are competing visions of the economy at the heart of this election — competing visions of what we look at and see as Amer- — as America.

Folks, one of the reasons I ran for President was to rebuild the backbone of the middle class, and we have.  We’re following my blue-collar blueprint to rebuild America.  And guess what?  It’s working. 

You’re building that America.  You’re — in this room — are building that America.

For example, thanks to my Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, more than 51,000 new manufacturing projects have been announced so far, and we’re just beginning.  It’s just beginning.  (Applause.)  It’s just — just starting.  (Applause.)

Roads, bridges, ports, airports, clean water systems, available high-speed Internet all across America and built by the Building Trades.  (Applause.)

Remember when President Pr- — Trump promised us — (laughs) — I’ve got to be careful.  (Laughter.)

AUDIENCE MEMBER:  Say it!  Say it!

THE PRESIDENT:  He promised us “Infrastructure Week.”  Well, I tell you what, it took four years; he never built a damn thing.  Nothing.  I’m serious.  (Applause.)  Are you surprised?

I’m sure — I’m making sure the projects, like project labor agreements, so highly skilled workers have a voice on the job. 

But even before Trump was president, Trump preferred non-union workers in his real estate projects.  And I don’t want to get into the stories.  But anyway.  Even he — even in that he didn’t keep his word.  He just asked contractors, vendors, and small businesses.  And — and if you read the press, if any of it’s true, he never paid them — a whole hell a lot of them.  The guy has never worked a day in a working man’s boots. 

By the way, he gave me a pair of boots as a gift, by the way.  (Laughter.)  I know how to put them on.  I still sometimes cut the yard.  The Secret Service doesn’t let me do it anymore.  (Laughter.)

Folks, I’m making Davis-Bacon requirements stronger to guarantee prevailing wage.  (Applause.) 

By the way, we’re making them stronger.  (Applause.)  That will — (applause) — that alone will increase wages for more than a million construction workers. 

Trump’s MAGA allies are trying to take it away now.  But it’s not going to happen on my watch.  (Applause.)

Since — since the 1930s, the law has said when the federal government spends taxpayers’ dollars on a project, it can only buy American products to do it and use American workers to get it done.  That’s “Buy America.”  Donald Trump failed to uphold that.  But not anymore.  My administration uses American products and American workers.  That’s why it’s going.  (Applause.)  I mean it.

Because, folks — (applause) — it’s — it’s not a joke.  It’s not a campaign line.  The God’s truth is you’re the best workers in the world.  That’s a fact.  You’re the best workers in the world. 

When I went out to South Korea to get them to beg- — start to build back those computer chips here in America, I said, “Why are you wil-” — and they decided to do it, invest- — investing billions of dollars.  I said, “Why are you doing it?”  He said, “Two things: You have the best workers in the world, and you have the safest place in the world to do it.”

Well, folks, when I think climate, I think jobs.  I think union jobs — good-paying jobs that don’t require a college degree. 

You’ve attracted nearly $700 billion in private-sector investment in advanced manufacturing, in semiconductors, clean energy, and so much more here in America, creating tens of thousands of good-paying jobs, Building Trades jobs.  In fact, construction of new factories has more than doubled in our administration.

Meanwhile — (applause) — meanwhile, Donald Trump still thinks windmills cause cancer.  (Laughter.)  That’s what he said. 

And, by the way, remember when he was trying to deal with COVID?  He said just inject a little bleach in your veins.  (Laughter.)  He missed; it all went to his hair.  (Laughter.)

Look, I shouldn’t have said that.  (Applause.)  I probably shouldn’t have said that.  (Laughter.)  You guys are a bad influence on me.  (Laughter.)

Trump and his MAGA allies want to repeal the most significant investments in climate ever — the work that — that you risked your lives doing lots of it.  You know, it — and he wants to risk all those jobs.  Are you surprised?  I’m not.

A lot of you don’t know that if you want to be a pipe fitter — a lot of people don’t know — if you want to be a pipe fitter or an electrician or any of the other trades here, it takes four or five years of hard work as an apprentice.

Most people think you can walk up (inaudible) — you guys should talk more about this.  They think you can walk up and you just say, “I want to be an electrician,” and you get a license.  It’s four or five years.  It’s like going back to college.  It’s going — like getting a college degree.

And that’s the reason — the reason you’re the best is because you’re the best trained in the world.  You get it; I get it.  But Donald Trump has no clue.

He undermined union apprenticeships by lowering standards and lowering pay.  He ended — I ended his anti-work policy to save the building trades apprenticeships program because they’re the gold standard of the world.  (Applause.)  They are.  They actually are.

And, look — and earlier this week — earlier this week, I teamed up together to recruit young people into the building trades.  It’s — my American Climate Corps will now pa- — pave a pathway to your apprenticeship program, because it matters.  It matters.

Through my American Rescue Plan, there’s — not a single Republican voted for, I might add — I also enacted the Butch Lewis Act — (applause) — the most pro-labor law in 50 years, because of you — because of you.  That one act — that one act has already protected hard-earned pensions of over 1 million workers and retirees and counting. 

We made that happen.  While Trump promised it, he never even lifted a finger to try to get it.  Are you surprised? 

AUDIENCE:  No!

THE PRESIDENT:  I — hell no, I’m not, either.  (Laughter.) 

Trump put union busters on the Nabor La- — the National Labor Relations Board throughout his administration.  I’ve appointed people in my administration that actually care about American workers, like former bui- — the building trades leader, Marty Walsh, who was a great Labor Secretary — (applause) — during my administration.  

By the way, if you ever need — if you’re ever in a foxhole, I tell you, you want Marty Walsh — (pronounced in an accent) — with you, man.  (Laughter.)  Oh, you think I’m kidding.  He’s the real deal.

You know, I’ve walked proudly on union picket lines, while at the same time, Trump bashed unions from non-union shops.  (Applause.)  Are you surprised?

AUDIENCE:  No!

THE PRESIDENT:  Look, I want to sign the PRO Act into law.  (Applause.) 

Trump said he’d veto it.  Trump said he’d veto it.  Beyond that, he supports a National Right to Work law, for God’s sake.

AUDIENCE:  Booo —

THE PRESIDENT:  No, I — think about it.  What is the single biggest killer that could happen?  A National Right to Work law. 

Look, he might as well say he doesn’t support any unions.

Are we going to let him — that happen, pal?  We’re not going to let that happen.

AUDIENCE:  No!

THE PRESIDENT:  Let me ask you: Does anyone here think the tax system is fair?  Raise your hand. 

Well, Trump is proud of his $2 trillion tax cut in his administration that overwhelmingly benefited the very wealthy and the biggest corporations while exploding the federal debt.  Trump added more to the national debt than any president in a single term in all of American history — to the national debt. 

I cut the national debt so far — (applause) — and still got all those other things did by doing simple things like, you know — remember those 40 Fortune 500 company — or those — those Fortune 500 companies, 40 of them — I think, no, it was 50 — who didn’t pay a single penny in taxes and made 40 billion dol- — 4 billion — $40 billion? 

Well, guess what?  I did a terrible thing.  I made them pay 15 percent.  (Laughter and applause.)  And we cut the deficit by $70 billion. 

Look, now Trump is saying if he gets elected, he wants to give another — by the way, that tax credit of his expires next year.  Okay?  (Applause.) 

Well, let me tell you something: It’s going to stay expired and dead forever if I’m reelected.  But anyway.  (Applause.)

He wants another — he wants to give another massive tax cut for the wealthy.  And he also says he wants to cut your Medicare and Social Security, and you’re going to let him — that happen? 

AUDIENCE:  Booo —

THE PRESIDENT:  No, he — by —

AUDIENCE:  Booo —

THE PRESIDENT:  By the way, these — these guys mean this stuff.  They mean it.  And the Republican caucus went ahead and said they want to do that too.

Look, folks, I remember there used to be two parties — real parties, you know.  But this ain’t your father’s Republican Party.  This is a different breed of cat.

Look, I got a better idea.  I’m going to protect Social Security and Medicare by making the very wealthy begin to pay their fair share of the — (applause) —

No billionaire — (applause) — look — look, guys — no billionaire — and there’s a thousand of them in America — a thousand billionaires — no billionaire should pay less in taxes than a teacher, a nurse, a construction worker, a police officer. 

Guess what?  You know what their average — average tax rate for a billionaire in America is?  8.3 percent.  That’s what they pay.  

AUDIENCE:  Booo —

THE PRESIDENT:  I’m serious.  I’m serious.  

Look, if we just charge them 24 percent in their tax, which isn’t the highest tax rate, we’d generate fi- — fifty- — $500 billion over the next 10 years, allow us to significantly cut the deficit, allow us to move all — have daycare.  Allo- — allow us to do so many things to make the country stronger.  

I want to point out one thing.  It’s a little off point, but I wanted you to remember it.  I asked the Treasury Department, because I was getting all this compliment and, from some, criticism about being so pro-union — I said, “What happens to wages generally when unions have to get paid a decent salary?”  Everybody’s salaries goes up.  Everybody.  (Applause.)  You grow the economy.  You grow the economy.  You grow the economy.  

Look, the bottom line is we’re doing what’s always worked best in this country: investing in all of America and all Americans.  

Our plan is working.  So far, we’ve created over 15 million new jobs, including 848,000 construction jobs for a record 8.2 million across the construction industry.

Folks — (applause) — and, by the way, did you know there are only two presidents in American history who left office with fewer American jobs than they entered it: Herbert Hoover and, yes, Donald “Herbert Hoover” Trump.  (Laughter and applause.)  Only two.  (Applause.)

Look, folks — folks, we’re moving again.  We’re moving again as a country.  We’re beginning to gain momentum.  We have the best economy in the world, but we got a lot more to do.  But we’re moving again because you guys and women.  I mean — I’m not being solicitous.  That’s why we’re moving.  We’re building again.  And we’re just getting started.  

Let me close with this.  As I travel the country, I see the amazing things you’re doing — I mean it, all over the country, in red states and blue states.  

And this past June, I was in Philadelphia, Sean’s hometown.  And I married a Philly girl.  You don’t screw around with Philly people.  (Laughter.)  

If I didn’t vote for every Phi- — root for every Philly team out there, I’d be sleeping alone.  (Laughter.)  You all think I’m kidding.  (Laughter.)  

Look, remember when that tanker truck crashed and closed the key stretch of I-95 in Philly?  It was expected, like in the last administration, it would take months and months for anything to happen.  

Well, 150,000 vehicles travel that overpass every single day.  So, what did we do?  We contacted all of you.  We organized.  You organized.  We rebuilt that.  You rebuilt that in less than two weeks, record time.  How?  Because you’re the building trades — laborers, operating engineers, cement finishers, plumbers, pipe fitters, steelworkers.  (Applause.)  So many union workers.  (Applause.)

You showed up — you showed up around the clock.  (Applause.)  And you got it done.  (Applause.)

By the way, that’s America.  

By the way, unions are more popular today than they’ve ever been in a long, long time, not because of Joe Biden supporting them — because of you.  You always step up.  You step into the breach.  You get things done.  

That’s the union movement.  That’s what it’s about.

In Baltimore, we’re moving heaven and earth — or as my dad, from Baltimore, would say, Baltimore ¬– Baltimore.  (Pronounced in an accent.)  

We’re moving heaven and earth to rebuild the F- — the Francis Scott Key Bridge after its tragic collapse, and we’re doing it with you — with union labor and American steel — (applause) — and American steel.

That’s America.  That’s the union movement.  (Applause.)

Look, folks, I mean you’re doing — you ought to see — I mean, I’ve been to the site.  It’s incredible.  I’ve been over that bridge a lot.  I mean, I commuted every day for 36 years as a U.S. senator, when my wife and daughter were killed and I used to commute back and forth to be with my boys.  And I’ve over that — that area in Baltimore Harbor.  You — it’s incredible what you’re doing.  

And, folks, the choice is clear.  Donald Trump’s vision of America is one of revenge and retribution.  A defeated former president who sees the world from Mar-a-Lago and bows down to billionaires, who looks down on American union workers.  It’s not just he’s not supporting; he looks down on us.  

I — no, I’m not joking.  Think about it.  Think about the guys you grew up with who you’d like to get into the corner and just give them a straight left.  (Laughter.)  I’m not suggesting we hit the president.  (Laughter.)  But we all know those guys growing up.  We all know guys like that growing up.  

My vision of America is one of hope and opportunity — the view from Scranton and working-class Americans like you.  

Here’s the future I see, and I mean this from the bottom of my heart.  I’ve never been more optimistic about America’s chances, not because I’m President, because of the state of the moment.  The world needs us.

Look at we — I just signed — we just signed the bill to give support to Ukraine.  We — (applause) — we rebuilt NATO.  (Applause.)  We increased it. 

Like it or not, we’re the leading country in the world.  The rest of the world looks to us.  

I see an America where we defend democracy, not diminish it.  I see an America where we protect freedoms, not take them away.  I see an economy that grows from the middle out and the bottom up, where the wealthy pay their fair share so we can have childcare, paid leave, and so much more, and still reduce the federal deficit and increase economic growth.  

Folks, imagine what we can do next.  Four —

AUDIENCE MEMBER:  (Inaudible.) 

THE PRESIDENT:  — more years (inaudible). 

AUDIENCE:  Four more years!  Four more years!  Four more years!

THE PRESIDENT:  Are you ready?

AUDIENCE:  Four more years!  Four more years!  Four more years!

THE PRESIDENT:  Are you ready to move forward?

AUDIENCE:  Four more years!  Four more years!  Four more years!

THE PRESIDENT:  Well, thank you.  We’re all ready.  We’re ready to move forward not back.  

Are we ready to choose unity over division, dignity over hate, truth over lies? 

Are you ready to choose freedom over democ- — for democracy?  (Applause.) 

We can do this.  I give you my word as a Biden, I’ve never been more optimistic about our future in my entire career.  

We just have to remember who we are.  And I mean this.  Think about it.  We are the United States of America, and there’s nothing beyond our capacity — nothing, nothing, nothing — when we do it together.  (Applause.)  We got to do it together.  

God bless you all.  God bless you all.  And may God protect our troops.  Thank you, thank you, thank you.  (Applause.) 

Thank you all.  I don’t want to go.  (Applause.) 

1:05 P.M. EDT 

The post Remarks by President Biden at the North America’s Building Trades Unions National Legislative Conference appeared first on The White House.

James S. Brady Press Briefing Room

2:47 P.M. EDT

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  Hi, good afternoon, everyone. 

Q    Good afternoon.

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  So, I — I’m just going to be super, super quick.  I’m going to turn things over to National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, who’s here to talk about the national security supplemental that the President, as you all know, signed this morning and — and our support for Ukraine — our continued support for Ukraine.

Jake. 

MR. SULLIVAN:  Well, thank you.  So, Karine was very short.  I’ll be a little bit longer because I have a few things to lay out. 

But wanted to start by saying that I’m sorry that we’re late for the podium today, but it’s — it’s for good reason, which is I’ve just come from being with the President, where he got the chance to meet with Abigail Edan, the four-year-old American who was held hostage by Hamas in Gaza and was released last November as part of the first hostage deal that the President was able to help broker and negotiate. 

But it was also a reminder, in getting to see her, that there are still Americans and others being held hostage by Hamas.  And we’re working day in, day out to ensure all of them also are able to get safely home to their loved ones.

The main reason I come to the podium today, though, is to follow up on the President’s remarks from earlier today and the very important, consequential vote that was taken in the Senate last night and the bill that was signed by the President this morning.

This morning, you heard President Biden speak about the critical importance of the national security supplemental, which came to the President’s desk, as we said it would, with overwhelming bipartisan support from the U.S. Congress.  I’ve stood at this podium numerous times and said, you know, the road may be full of twists and turns, I can’t predict exactly when it will happen, but I always had confidence it would happen.  

And that’s because of the deep reservoir of support there is for Ukraine.  And that’s true of Democrats, it’s true of Republicans, it’s true of independents.  And that’s what’s shown through in the votes, both in the House and the 79-vote aye vote outcome we saw in the Senate last night.

The passage of this bill sends a powerful message to the rest of the world about the enduring strength of American leadership.  And believe me, the world has been and continues to watch closely. 

As you all know, getting this legislation through Congress has been a top priority for President Biden since he first submitted his supplemental request more than six months ago.  And it gets to a core tenet of his foreign policy philosophy: When our friends and allies are stronger, we, the United States and the American people, are stronger.   And when our friends are attacked or threatened, we, the United States, stand up for them.  We do our part.  We keep our word.

And with that signature this morning, the President kept America’s word that we would stand with Ukraine through thick and thin, and that’s exactly what we will do.

When Russia began amassing troops on Ukraine’s borders, the President rallied the world to respond to Russia’s aggression.  He built a broad coalition that flowed critical aid to Ukraine as the Ukrainian people defended themselves and then won the battle for Kyiv, the battle for Kharkiv, the battle for Kherson, and regained half the territory that Russia occupied since 2022.

And the bill the President signed today and the significant and immediate military aid package he approved one minute later will send Ukraine the supplies that it needs to make a significant different — difference as they continue to fight for their sovereignty and territorial integrity. 

The bill will also help replenish Israel’s air defenses, which is even more important following Iran’s brazen and unprecedented attack 10 days ago.  And it will help ensure that Israel has what it needs to defend itself against the very real threats it faces from Iran as well as Iran’s proxy groups.

The supplemental will substantially increase humanitarian aid for Palestinian civilians in Gaza, who are suffering so grievously, as we work to build on the progress of the past two weeks in terms of an increase in the amount of lifesaving humanitarian assistance that has been and must continue to flow into Gaza.  And the quantities and the type of humanitarian assistance that we have seen increase over the last two weeks, we need to see continued increases and sustained increases as we go forward.

The bill will also enhance and expand humanitarian aid for those who have been impacted by instability, by conflict, by disaster all over the world, including in Haiti, in Sudan, and Somalia.

The bill makes important investments in our defense industrial base that will strengthen our own military.  And, of course, it provides timely support to our allies and partners in the Indo-Pacific as well.

Getting this bill passed entailed months of advocacy, hands-on work by President Biden himself, by his White House team, by his national security team, and countless briefings, meetings, hearings by departments and agencies across our government for the Congress in both the House and the Senate.

It was a long road to secure this funding.  And I have to say, standing here today, it was too long.  And the consequences of the delay have been felt in Ukraine.  Over the past six months, Ukraine has had to ration ammunition, and that has resulted in the loss of some territory in the east, including the city of Avdiivka.

And while today’s announcement is very good news for Ukraine, they are still under severe pressure on the battlefield, and it is certainly possible that Russia could make additional tactical gains in the coming weeks. 

Russia has tried to grind out very slow, costly progress on multiple fronts over the past few weeks.  They are threatening the town of Chasiv Yar.  They are threatening settlements to the west of Avdiivka.   And, of course, they’re raining hell down on Kharkiv and other cities across Ukraine. 

The fact is that it’s going to take some time for us to dig out of the hole that was created by six months of delay before Congress passed the supplemental.  And that’s why the minute the President signed the supplemental, he turned and signed a very substantial drawdown package that includes urgently needed artillery and HIMARS ammunition, more armored vehicles, Javelins, Stingers, and air defense interceptors, among other things.  These capabilities are going to start moving immediately to make up for lost time.

At this critical moment, this is a way to show in deed as well as in word that the United States stands with Ukraine.

And despite the challenges that I’ve just described, I think it is very important for us to underscore that as we look ahead to the rest of 2024, our view is that Ukraine retains key advantages in this fight.  Uk- — Ukraine can and will prevail, and that will be thanks to the bravery of its people but also the support of its friends.

First, the Ukrainian military remains a resilient, brave, and effective fighting force.  And even as the Ukrainians waited for U.S. security assistance, they were able to impose significant costs on Russia.  Since the start of 2024, we estimate that Ukraine has destroyed more than 700 Russian armored vehicles and roughly 250 Russian tanks.

Russia, meanwhile, has had to continue to throw its soldiers into this fight without proper training and equipment.

Second, our allies, as the President said this morning, have been mobilizing in support of Ukraine alongside us.  Just yesterday, the UK announced a significant new package of military aid for Ukraine, alongside major investments that they are making in their defense industrial base, putting their defense budget on a path to reach 2.5 percent of their GDP by the end of the decade.  And the United States welcomes these moves from a stalwart ally.

Germany recently announced the donation of another Patriot system to Ukraine. 

The Czech government, whose Prime Minister was just here recently, has raised enough money to purchase half a million artillery shells for Ukraine, with hundreds of thousands more beyond that to follow. 

And Estonia recently announced its own ambitious effort to secure even more artillery and other forms of ammunition for Ukraine.

And then, third, the United States is building up our capacity to support Ukraine.  For example, we’re investing in our own domestic production of 155-millimeter artillery rounds.  Since the start of this conflict, we’ve more than doubled our monthly production of 155.  By the end of this year, we will have doubled it again.  And as a result, we’re going to be able to provide, from our own production, steady and significant supplies of artillery to Ukraine.

We are also providing Ukraine with new capabilities.  I’m able to confirm, as you’ve heard from others, that in February the President directed his team to provide Ukraine with a significant number of ATACMS missiles for use inside Ukraine’s sovereign territory.  That shipment started moving in March as part of the PDA that the President authorized on March 12th, and those missiles have arrived in Ukraine. 

This followed Russia’s procurement and use of North Korea’s ballistic missiles against Ukraine, as well as Russia’s renewed and escalating attacks against civilian infrastructure in Ukraine. 

Until recently, as we’ve said on many occasions, we were unable to provide these ATACMS because of readiness concerns.  But behind the scenes, the administration across the board has worked relentlessly to address those concerns.  We now have a significant number of ATACMS coming off the production line and entering U.S. stocks.  And as a result, we can move forward with providing ATACMS while also sustaining the readiness of the U.S. armed forces.

The path ahead will not be easy.  Russia is going to continue to press its attacks against Ukrainian defenses.  But for the reasons that I have laid out, over time, we assess that Ukraine’s position in this conflict will improve, and we believe that Ukraine can and will win.

As I have said from this podium before, no one — no one in this room and no one anywhere else — should underestimate the Ukrainian people, and no one should underestimate President Biden’s resolve and the American people’s resolve and a bipartisan majority in — both in the House and the Senate’s resolve to stand with Ukraine.

And with that, I’d be happy to take your questions.

Yeah.

Q    Thank you, Jake.  How big of an impact will these long-range ATACMS have on the battlefields in Ukraine?  And will more long-range ATACMS be sent to Ukraine as part of this $60 billion aid package?

MR. SULLIVAN:  So, we’ve — as I said in my opening comments, we’ve already sent some.  We will send more now that we have additional both authority and money.  I’m not going to get into specific numbers for operational reasons.

I believe they will make a difference.  But as I’ve said before at this podium — and as you’ve heard from Secretary Austin, the Chairman, and other senior military officials — there is no silver bullet in this conflict.  One capability is not going to be the ultimate solution.  It is an amalgam of capabilities that come together and combine with the bravery and skill of Ukraine’s fighters that’s going to make the difference in this conflict.

So, we think it’s good that we’re able to provide them, but I don’t expect to stand before you and say one capability has — has been the silver bullet in this conflict.

Q    Are you worried that it could provoke Russia?  Because they had said that sending these long-range missiles could be crossing the red line.

MR. SULLIVAN:  What we have seen from the Russians is their willingness to accept long-range missiles from other countries, specifically North Korea.  They have used those in the battlefield.  They have used them to attack Ukrainian civilians as well. 

So, from our perspective, now that we’ve resolved our readiness concerns, being able to step up and provide our own capabilities to Ukraine, as partners of ours have — the UK, the French, others — we think it’s appropriate to do at this moment.  We think it is a good capability in this phase of the conflict for Ukraine, and we will stand behind that four-square.

Yeah.

Q    Jake, you know, on Israel.  They’ve made a number of commitments in terms of what they need to do on the ground in order to receive the aid that they’re getting from the United States.  With the reports that we’ve seen of mass graves at two medical facilities in Gaza that they destroyed, is it your current view that they are living up to those commitments?

MR. SULLIVAN:  Well, those reports were deeply disturbing. We have been in touch at multiple levels with the Israeli government.  We want answers.  We want to understand exactly what happened.  You’ve seen some public commentary from the IDF on that, but we want to know the specifics of what the circumstances of this were.  And we want to see this thoroughly and transparently investigated so that the whole world can have a comprehensive answer and we, the United States, can as well.

I can’t speak beyond that because, of course, we’re in the early days of fully understanding what happened. 

We also received a series of commitments from the Israeli government with respect to the facilitation of humanitarian assistance. 

President — (a cellphone rings).

Q    That’s all for today, Jake.  Time’s up.

MR. SULLIVAN:  (Laughs.)  That’s what the — that’s “The Gong Show”?  (Laughter.)

You know, President Biden spoke with Prime Minister Netanyahu a little more than two weeks ago.  And in the time that has unfolded since his conversation with Prime Minister Netanyahu, we have seen a marked increase in the amount of humanitarian assistance that has gone into Gaza and, importantly, a very significant increase in the amount of assistance that has gone to Northern Gaza, where the U.N. and others had told us the challenges of malnutrition and potential famine were most acute.

So, we think we have made a significant set of steps forward on this, but — and this is a very important “but” — it needs to be sustained and it needs to be increased even further.

We’ve seen moves at Ashdod.  We’ve seen initial moves through crossings in the north.  Again, those are good steps, but we need to see that expanded, institutionalized, and ensure that, on a steady basis, the level and intensity and scope of humanitarian assistance meets the need.  And we’re going to stay focused until we ensure that that is the case. 

Yeah.

Q    Thanks, Jake.  What kind of mechanism does the U.S. have in place to ensure that these long-range ATACMS will only be used within Ukrainian territory and will not be fired into Russian territory?

MR. SULLIVAN:  Well, we now have an extended period of time where we have tested these commitments from the Ukrainian government, which they have made with respect to other systems as well, including HIMARS, where they have said, “We will only use these on Ukrainian sovereign territory.  We won’t use them beyond the borders of Ukraine.” 

They have followed through on that commitment time and time again with respect to the systems that we have provided them, so we have confidence they will follow through on this commitment as well.

Q    And then on this new —

MR. SULLIVAN:  Yeah.

Q    — hostage video that was just released by Hamas of Hersh Goldberg-Polin.  What’s your understanding of why Hamas is re- — releasing this video now?  Is it because the U.S. was insisting on some proof of life?  Or is this a provocation of some sort?

MR. SULLIVAN:  We have insisted on proof of life, we have insisted on the release of all of these hostages from the beginning.  And so, there’s been no change in our position with respect to proof of life.  So, I can’t speak to what has caused them to choose to release the video at this time. 

All I can say is this is a — an innocent young man being held hostage by a terrorist organization, and he should be released immediately without condition and without delay. 

I have not had the personal opportunity to speak with his parents since this video was released.  I’m intending to do that. 

I don’t want to speak further on this, because of the sensitivity of the issue, other than to say I was just sitting with the President of the United States going through all of the Americans being held hostage and what we can do about them, what their status is.  It’s something he is personally very focused on, even as he celebrates Abigail’s release. 

So, this is something we will continue to make a paramount priority for President Biden and for the United States. 

Yeah.

Q    I know you don’t want to detail it much further.  But just for clarity, can you assess — is there any assessment of how recent this video was made, if this was made just days after?  He does have, sort of, a date stamp in how long he says he’s been held.  What is the U.S.’s understanding on that?

And separately, can you pull back the curtain on the visit with Abigail Edan and her family?  You were there.  How is she — her spirits, her family?  What was the moment like?  What were the interactions like?  If you could, invite us into that room.

MR. SULLIVAN:  The moment that we got the video that showed Hersh, we gave it to the FBI Hostage Fusion Recovery Cell.  Those are the experts who have the technical capacity to actually look at that video and discern or at least assess with as much specificity as possible the answers to your questions.

They are in the process of doing that.  I’m not going to get ahead of that assessment —

Q    Okay.

MR. SULLIVAN:  — to make any judgments about time, you know, recency, et cetera.  I will let them make those judgments.  And then when we have something we can share publicly, in light of all the sensitivities, we’ll share it with you. 

You know, President Biden will speak to this himself because this was his meeting, his opportunity to see Abigail, to see her family, to see her siblings.  Abigail and her — her two siblings had their parents killed on October 7th.  So, they’re still living with the tragedy and the trauma of that.  Abigail, of course, is living with the trauma of being held captive for — for many weeks. 

But this was a — a moment of joy as well because she was able to be returned safely to her family.  And I think, for the President, the most important thing was it was a reminder of the work still to do and how important it is for him personally and for the government to do all that we can to secure a ceasefire and hostage deal so that everybody can come home. 

Yeah.

Q    Thanks, Jake.  This bill also authorized the President to seize Russian-dollar assets.  Is that something he’s prepared to do unilaterally?  Or will he have to consult with allies before making any kind of decision?

MR. SULLIVAN:  Well, the G7 has said collectively that Russia’s assets are going to remain immobilized until they are put to use for recovery in Ukraine.  The precise way in which that happens, the mechanism is still being — is still a matter of consultation with our European partners. 

Look, the ideal is that we all move together — that Europe and the United States, especially since the bulk of the assets are held in Europe, come up with a common way forward for how we ensure that these sovereign assets actually go to work rebuilding and reconstructing Ukraine. 

And I will not go further than that today because we are in the middle of intense consultations with our European partners. 

I can tell you this is going to be an important subject of conversation at the G7 summit in June.  But I will leave it at that for today.

Q    Can you provide us with an update on the latest on the Rafah invasion?  What’s the latest that the Israelis have told the administration?  And on timing, do you expect them to hold off as these talks continue?

MR. SULLIVAN:  I will say that you hear a lot of different public comments from different Israeli officials, different media reports — some on the record, some off the record, some on background — circling dates, stating what’s going to happen definitively, changing what’s going to happen definitively, so I will be entirely out of the business of commenting, predicting, or representing what exactly Israel will do when it comes to Rafah.

What I can tell you is the U.S. position has been clear on this.  I’ve stated it from this podium.  The President has spoken to it.  And we’ve had very detailed discussions with the Israelis as recently as last week by secure video to talk through not just our concerns but our view that there is a different way to go about dealing with the Hamas threat in Rafah and succeeding in ensuring the long-term defense and security of Israel. 

We are still in those conversations, and we will still continue to press our perspective.  And I will leave it at that for today because that conversation is midstream.  It has not been concluded. 

Yeah.

Q    Thanks, Jake.  This bill gives ByteDance 270 days to sell TikTok due to those national security concerns, which could lead to a national ban.  In the meantime, is it safe for President Biden’s campaign and any other political entity to be on TikTok?

MR. SULLIVAN:  So, I’m going to let campaigns decide for themselves what they’re going to do. 

The terms of the bill are straightforward.  TikTok continues to operate as it is right now until such time as either there is divestment or the time that you’ve referred to elapses.  And so, what we’re focused on right now in implementing the bill is working through that divestment in a way that is consistent with the intent of the law and consistent with the national security concerns that brought the law into force in the first place. 

Yeah.

Q    The war will stretch far beyond the $61 billion in aid.  So, can the Ukrainians have any confidence that the fight over Congress — the fight over money in Congress won’t repeat itself next year?

And, you know, has Putin planned for these skirmishes in the U.S. Congress as he continues the invasion in Ukraine?

MR. SULLIVAN:  Well, look, I’ve said this before — and maybe it’s even an understatement to say it again — that democracy is messy.  There’s a lot of to-ing and fro-ing, a lot of twists and turns. 

But I think really what this weekend showed is that, at the end of the day, despite substantial effort by a lot of parties, including the Russians, to figure out a way to not have this bill pass, it has passed.  And I think the message that that sends is that, at the end of the day, when push comes to shove, the United States is going to be there with the resources necessary for Ukraine. 

I believe that today, I believed that one year ago, and I believe that will be true one year from now. 

Yeah. 

Q    Yeah.  Thanks, Jake.  You referred to the hole that was dug because of the six-month delay in Congress.  How deep is that hole?  How much was — did l- — Ukraine lose on the battlefield as a result of inaction? 

And, secondly, how long does the U.S. expect this $61 billion to last before it is completely withdrawn?

MR. SULLIVAN:  So, you can —

Q    (Inaudible.)

MR. SULLIVAN:  — you can measure the impact in different ways.  With respect to actual territory, we’re talking about tactical losses in the east, not some fundamental structural shift in the underlying dynamic of the conflict. 

But you can also measure it just in terms of the — the wear and tear in places on a frontline unit who has to ration ammunition because they’re not getting the steady flows.  And that’s a bit more incalculable. 

And the President referred in his remarks earlier today to the reports of Ukrainian troops literally cheering in the trenches, watching on their phones, as the House passed the bill over the weekend.  That goes to show you how closely they are following the — the U.S. Congress, because it means the difference between having them — the tools they need to put up that fight effectively and not having those tools. 

So, our view is that that has caused, obviously, some significant wear and tear on the forces, as well as some tactical losses on the battlefield, and has also created the existing pressure that we see even today with Russian unit — units pushing forward in places they were not previously pushing forward. 

But we also believe, as I laid out — maybe in too much detail for some of you — that there are fundamental structural drivers that favor Ukraine here.  And part of that is about what the U.S. industrial base can produce.  Part of it is about what the Europeans have stepped up to do in really significant ways over the course of the — the last six months.  And we are urging them to keep that going, even as the U.S. has delivered $60 billion.  Part of that is about the Ukrainian capacity itself.  And then, of course, we are adding new capabilities like the ATACMS. 

So, you put all that together and I think the calculus of the Russians or the critics of Ukraine who say, “Time is on Russia’s side” — they’ve got it wrong.  We believe that the structural dynamics of this conflict favor the country defending its own territory.  We believe that occupation and invasion saps the will and vitality of a nation over time. 

And as long as Ukraine gets the tools that it needs to defend itself, it can do so effectively and it can win.  And we have now taken a major step forward in giving it the tools that it needs to defend itself, and we insist that we will continue to do so. 

Q    And then a second question.  In terms of how long it’ll last, I mean, how — until it’s completely drawn down.  Is there any — should it last the rest of this year?  I mean, how — how long are we talking here?

MR. SULLIVAN:  I do anticipate that with the amount of resources we have right now, we can continue to supply Ukraine with what it needs through 2024.

Q    Jake?

MR. SULLIVAN:  Yeah.

Q    Thanks, Jake.  There’s been some satellite imagery of tents popping up near Khan Younis and — and Rafah as well.  Do you have an assessment of what these were built for?  Is this related to Israel’s potential invasion in Rafah imminently?

MR. SULLIVAN:  So, I have seen the reports.  I don’t know, actually, exactly what they refer to.  It is certainly the case that U.N. organizations, NGOs, other governments are working to actually build out shelter, sanitation, distribution points for humanitarian assistance in Khan Younis now that major military operations there have abated. 

So, sort of setting aside the question of Rafah for the moment, which is a hard question to set aside, there’s going to be a significant amount of humanitarian activity in Khan Younis regardless, as there can and should be in Gaza City as well as we get more aid to the north. 

So, I can’t speak specifically to these reports, how they relate to Israel’s future military operations, because I’ve only seen them kind of written in the newspaper.  I haven’t yet seen what exactly they’re referring to.

But we’ll stay in close touch not just with the Israelis, but with the United Nations.  In fact, on a daily basis, at senior levels, we’re talking to the U.N. as they try to coordinate the humanitarian element of this. 

And, frankly, for those people — innocent civilians — who are not in Rafah, they too need and deserve shelter, support, food, medicine, and everything else.  And, you know, we are insisting that that happen, in addition to ensuring the safety and protection of the people of Rafah.

Q    And then really quickly on the in-person talks that were scheduled to happen.  I know you guys have been meeting virtually with Israeli counterparts. 

MR. SULLIVAN:  Yeah. 

Q    Is there anything planned upcoming for an in-person conversation?

MR. SULLIVAN: So, we had an in-person one planned, and then, as you all may have noticed, there was a series of events related to Israel over the course of the past two weeks that made it difficult, frankly, for anybody to leave their desks.  I couldn’t leave my desk.  My counterparts in Israel couldn’t leave their desk because we were hunkered down trying to put together the coalition that helped defend Israel against that unprecedented Iranian attack and then deal with the aftermath of it. 

I expect we will get together in person relatively soon, but we don’t have a date circled on the calendar right now.

Q    Thanks.  Thanks so much, Jake.  Back to the structural dynamics in Ukraine that you talked about earlier.  Ukraine is facing a very severe troop shortage at the moment.  Is there anything in this package that will address the fact that Ukraine needs more troops on the frontlines and that they’ve struggling to — to get the numbers that they need over the past several months?

MR. SULLIVAN:  It’s a very good question.  Obviously, this package does not include troops.  It includes the capabilities that troops will need, but Ukraine itself will have to supply the troops.

Now, as we were working day in, day out to get this bill passed, President Biden was also working with President Zelenskyy to talk through how President Zelenskyy was thinking about the issue of mobilization and getting enough forces forward to the fight. 

And actually, as you know, just in the last couple of weeks, Ukraine has passed a new mobilization law.  And, also, the new commander-in-chief, General Syrskyi, has put in place — along with the Defense Minister, Umerov — a series of protocols to increase the number of forces that are being mobilized each month so that Ukraine has the manpower it needs to go along with the capabilities it is now getting. 

And we will start to see the impact of that month by month as they implement the new mobilization law and as they implement the new directives from the Minister of Defense and the — the new commander of the — of the Ukrainian Armed Forces.

Q    Jake.

MR. SULLIVAN:  Yeah.

Q    Jake, the North Korean envoy has recently se- — sent to Iran.  And considering the fact that both ballistic missiles and the Shahed drones have been sent to Ukraine to fight against the Ukrainian forces, can I get your opinion on this?

MR. SULLIVAN:  Well, the President today made a comment that, you know, I’ll just repeat, which is for the six months that we were not actually passing the necessary resources for Ukraine, Putin was looking to his friends.  And he was getting those drones from Iran, he was getting those missiles from North Korea, and he was getting support for the Russian defense industrial base from China. 

And that is not lost on us.  It’s something that we are dealing with on all three fronts.  And we will continue to do that.  And you’ve heard Secretary Blinken, obviously, who’s now in Beijing, speak to our concerns with respect to the PRC and its support for Russia’s defense industrial base.  And we have been vocal from this podium about both North Korea and Iran, and we’ll continue to be. 

Yeah.

Q    Thank you, Jake.  Israeli government officials are saying that the President has backed down on possibly sanctioning the IDF Netzah Yehuda unit — battalion.  Is there any truth to that?  Is that still under consideration?  And, if not, why not?

MR. SULLIVAN:  On this one, I’ve got to refer you to the State Department, because they run a rigorous, detailed analysis of what’s called the Leahy Law, which looks at gross violations of human rights by particular units.  It has been taking a look at these questions for multiple countries.  And I can’t — it wouldn’t be appropriate for me to speak on their behalf.  So, the State Department will ultimately have to speak to this.

Q    Okay.

MR. SULLIVAN:  I would only point out that the nomenclature of “sanction” is not accurate.  What we are talking about here is, if the Leahy Law is implemented, it has implications for how we deal with a particular unit.  But it’s not, in the classic sense, a sanction.  It’s something well known and applied in multiple jurisdictions around the world. 

But this really is something that we take care to separate from politics, to separate from, you know, decisions taken at the White House.  It is a State Department analysis with a State Department outcome.  And they can speak to what is going to happen at the time that they’re ready to speak to it.

Q    Having — having said that, a number of State Department officials, including some recently departed former officials, have told my colleagues that their understanding of the situation is that the President’s views on — on Israel have been a roadblock to applying the Leahy Law as you have just described. 

Can you tell us, right here, whether the President would intervene in that State Department process that you alluded to to prevent Leahy Law restrictions being placed on Israel?

MR. SULLIVAN:  I — I think I did just tell you.  He will not.  The White House will not intervene in that.  That is a process run out of the State Department, and you should go there.  And my strong guess is that the State Department officials you’re referring to have never sat in a meeting with President Biden on Israel and are merely speculating based on whatever their own perspective is. 

But I’ve said it to you, plain and simple: The State Department will make these judgments.  They’ll make them according to the analysis and the timeline they deem appropriate.  And — and the questions about how that all plays out are best directed to their podium.

Q    Way in the back, Jake.

MR. SULLIVAN:  Yeah.

Q    Thank you.  Just on Ukraine.  Now that the United States is sending long-range missile systems to Ukraine, do you expect that Germany would follow?  Would you welcome such a step from them?

MR. SULLIVAN:  I would refer you to Berlin on that.

Yeah.

Q    Thank you.  You’ve been talking about a very detailed discussion with the Israeli government about possible invasion in Rafah.  Does this administration still consider Prime Minister Netanyahu as a valuable partner?

MR. SULLIVAN:  As a what?

Q    Valuable partner.

MR. SULLIVAN:  I’m not sure I understand what you mean by that.

Q    As a partner that you can trust.

MR. SULLIVAN:  He’s the Prime Minister of Israel.  We deal with whoever is sitting in the chair as the Prime Minister of Israel, because ultimately the decisions that are taken are taken under his leadership of his Cabinet. 

And so, we will continue in — to engage with the Prime Minister — the President will.  We’ll continue to engage with his team in an effort for them to fully understand our perspective and where we think the right steps forward are and to listen to them as well.  And ultimately, the President will make his own decisions about U.S. policy consistent with U.S. interests and values.

Yeah.

Q    Thank you very much, Jake.  On Iran, North Korea, and Russia.  It was reported that North Koreans’ economic delegations will be dispatched to Iran to discuss nuclear missile cooperation with Iran.  As you know, that — Iran used North Korea-made missiles in an airstrike against Israel.  What impact do you predict that military cooperation between Iran, North Korea, and Russia will have on the Middle East situation and Korean Peninsula?

MR. SULLIVAN:  Well, episodically, over the course of many years and many administrations, we’ve seen various linkages in — and defense cooperation between North Korea and Iran.  That’s come and gone, ebbed and flowed.

What is new, what is different over the course of the last two years has really been the cooperation between Iran and Russia with this massive provision of drones and North Korea and Russia with a massive provision of many different capabilities, including artillery, but also including ballistic missiles that go quite a long range, pack a punch, and are being used to terrorize cities across Ukraine. 

And we believe that this is a matter of grave concern to the security of Europe, way beyond the borders of Ukraine. 

And to your question, we’re also concerned about what may happen in the other direction: What is Russia going to provide to North Korea or Iran that will destabilize the Indo-Pacific or destabilize the Middle East?  That’s something that we’re watching very closely.

Yeah.

Q    Thanks, Jake.  Tomorrow is the funeral service for the seven World Central Kitchen aid workers who were killed.  Why is the President not going?

MR. SULLIVAN:  Well, the President will have a letter from him read at the service.  And you will see the Second Gentleman there.  The President, of course, has had a longstanding plan to go up to Micron, the facility up in Syracuse.  He will continue with that.  But he has spoken directly with Chaef [sic] Jose Andre- — Chef Jose Andres about this tragic event. 

And, of course, in the immediate aftermath of it, he picked up the phone and called Bibi Netanyahu.  And what we have seen since then, as I was speaking about before with respect to the provision and facilitation of humanitarian assistance, has been a significant difference.  But the administration will be well represented at that event.

Yeah.

Q    Thank you.  Two questions.  One on Iran.  Part of the deal that was signed by the President today had a collection of sanctions on Iran, on the Islamic Republic — namely, human rights, drones, their dealings with China, the oil export.  What is the administration trying to achieve with this set of sanctions that has not already achieved in the past three years?

And my second question is about this National Security Memorandum 20, which is an independent task which they called the suspen- — for the suspension of the U.S. arms transfer to Israel because they are accusing Israel Defense Forces of a “systematic pattern of war crime.”  What does the administration say about this?

MR. SULLIVAN:  So, on National Security Memorandum 20, which the President signed some weeks ago, we have a report that will be sent up to the Congress in early May.  That report will analyze the elements of National Security Memorandum 20.  And obviously, then, we will present the findings of that to all of you as well.  And I’m not going to get ahead of that report.  I think we should let them work through rigorously the analysis, which will be done on an interagency basis by the U.S. government.

And your first question was about Iran sanctions.  Look, I think the moment we’re in right now that’s quite different from where we were just a few weeks ago is you’ve actually had the G7 come out together and say that we need to impose additional economic measures, additional sanctions, additional pressure on Iran for this brazen and unprecedented attack against Israel with more than 300 missiles and drones fired at Israeli territory. 

The EU has moved, the UK has moved, the United States has moved, and we will continue to move.  And extra authorities from Congress can help add to the — the types of forms of pressure that we can place and the type of isolation we can generate with respect to Iran, which is acting in ways that are fundamentally irresponsible and destabilizing the peace and stability in the Middle East. 

I’ll take one more question.  Yeah.

Q    I wanted to follow up on — I know you had to not go to Riyadh, to Saudi Arabia.  I hope you’re feeling better, by the way. 

MR. SULLIVAN:  Thank you. 

Q    But has that been rescheduled, first? 

And secondly, can you give us an update on, sort of, what movement there has been on these normalization talks between Saudi Arabia and Israel?

MR. SULLIVAN:  I do expect to get to Saudi Arabia in the next few weeks.  We haven’t literally scheduled it because things have been a bit in flux.  But we will get it back on the calendar in the near term.  I’ll let you know when I plan to get out there.

Thank you for your concern.  I do feel quite a bit better.  (Laughter.)  But as any of you who’ve cracked a rib know, it — it takes a long time.  So, call me at 80 percent right now.  Meanwhile, I’m physically deteriorating in all other ways, but — (laughter) — that’s a matter for another time. 

And then, in terms of where we are on normalization talks, I really want to have the opportunity to sit with the senior Saudi leadership, get their perspective in person.  I’d be happy to report back to you after that.  It’s something that we want to continue to work on.  

Although every week or so, I read a new story about how there’s a renewed initiative, a different initiative, a new — you know, this is steady, consistent diplomacy aiming at an endpoint that we’ve been quite clear about.  But there haven’t been any kind of dramatic developments over the course of the past few weeks.  It’s something we continue to work at.  We’ll talk with the Saudis.  We’ll see where we are.  And obviously, we have to talk with the Israelis as well, because they would be a part of the larger outcome here if we could generate it. 

And with that, I’ll turn it over to Karine.  Thanks, everyone.

Q    Thanks, Jake.

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  Thank you.

All right.  Thanks, everybody.  Thanks, Jake. 

I do have a — something at the top for all of you, and then we can get into Q&A. 

Over the last — the lo- — the last two days, our administration took several new steps to protect workers and consumers.

The FTC banned non-compete agreements, which currently keep 30 million workers, nearly one in five, from changing jobs.  This rule will increase wages by at least $400 billion over the next 10 years.

The Labor Department raised the salary threshold for overtime, extending overtime protections to millions of workers.  As the President put it: If you work extra hours, you deserve extra pay.

The Lad- — Labor Department is also protecting retirement security by requiring financial advisors to act in the saver’s best interest, not their own.  This will save millions of Americans thousands of dollars for their retirement accounts.

The Transportation Department is helping consumers get what they are owed by requiring airlines to provide passengers with cash refunds when flights are canceled or significantly changed, checked bags are significantly delayed, or services like Wi-Fi are not provided.

The Transportation Department is — is also cracking down on surprise junk fees by requiring airlines to tell consumers upfront what they are being charged for checked bags, carrying on bags, and changing or canceling a reservation.

These are just the latest parts of — parts of President Biden’s agenda to protect workers and lower costs.  The President is building an economy that lifts up working Americans and middle-class families.

With that, Colleen.

Q    Thanks, Karine.

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  Yeah.

Q    So, the backlash is growing at Morehouse College over the President’s upcoming address, and it sort of mirrors all these other college protests over Gaza.  I’m wondering how the President is going to manage increasing student concerns as the violence wears on. 

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  So, look, we know it’s a incredibly painful time for many communities.  You hear us say that often.  You have heard us mention the President meeting with different community — community leaders and community members, obviously, from the — for — from the different — the different communities, obviously, the different groups, to be more specise [precise], whether it’s Arab Americans, Muslim Americans, Palestinian Americans, to have those difficult conversation, to have those honest conversations. 

And you’ve heard the White House — you’ve heard us talk about the White House staff, officials having regular, ongoing meetings with these different groups.

Look, as it relates to commencements, they’re about the graduates, right?  They’re about their families.  They’re about their loved ones.  It’s about celebrating accomplishments.  And the President is certainly looking forward to doing that.  He’s going to do that at Morehouse.  He’s going to do that at West Point — West Point, where those are graduates where he’s going to be thanking them for their service and defending — obviously, for defending our — our nation. 

So, the President is going to look — is looking forward to being part of that.  He has always — it’s not the first time, obviously, that he’s given commencement speeches.

I understand this is a different moment in time that we’re in.  But he always takes this moment as a special time to deliver a message — an encouraging message, a message that’s hopefully uplifting to the graduates and their families.  And we’re going to continue to have these conversations that I’ve been — that I’ve just mentioned with the different communities about what’s happening right now. 

We get it.  It’s painful.  We get that.  We understand that.

Q    Is there a concern that he would be, I don’t know, disinvited from Morehouse or anything?  Is he planning to go?

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  So, look, I’m certainly goi- — not going to speculate or go into hypotheticals.  The President is certainly looking forward to these commencements — these two upcoming commencements — Morehouse and the United States Military Academy next month.  And he is — he has done these many times before, understanding the important, critical — not critical but important moment and how special that moment is for the graduates and their families.  And he is going to do his best to meet that moment as it relates to what’s going on, the pain that communities are feeling. 

We’re going to continue to have those conversations and be sensitive to that, understanding what people are going through.

Q    On the Supreme Court.

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  Yeah.

Q    It — the Court appears pretty skeptical that federal law trumps state law in Idaho over the abortion ban there.  I just wondered, you know, that — EMTALA was a — a major —

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  Yeah.

Q    — part of the administration’s efforts to sort of protect women or give additional healthcare to women.  So, if that is on the chopping block, what else can the administration do?

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  So, I’m going to be careful, because it’s ongoing.  So — parts of this, especially because it’s an ongoing litigation —

Q    Yeah.

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  — have to refer you to the Department of Justice.

More broadly, the administration is going to continue, certainly, to defend women’s ability to ac- — to access emergency care that they need, they should — they should have under federal law.  And so, that is a commitment that this administration is going to continue to ensure.

And — and, so — look, we’re — we’re going to stay focused on that.  We’re going to let the — the litigation process continue.  So, just not going to get beyond that. 

But, more broadly, we believe that women should not be denied the ne- — the access of healthcare that they need. 

We’ve been very clear in the Biden-Harris administration about how important it is that women get that emergency care.  We’re talking about lives.  We’re talking about women’s lives here and being able to make those all-important decisions on their healthcare. 

We’ve been consistent about that.  We’re going to continue that fight.  And so, we remain focused on ensuring that we prevail in the courts, and that’s our commitment to women.

Go ahead.

Q    Thanks, Karine.

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  Yeah.

Q    The House Speaker is heading to Columbia today.  He’s calling on the president of Columbia to resign.  Does the President share that view?  And what does he think of the way that the administration at Columbia has been handling this?

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  So, going to be really mindful.  Columbia is a private institution.  We’re not — we — I mean, we’ve been very consistent here about not commenting on personnel matters.  That’s something for Columbia University — obviously, the board to speak to and the president — right? — to make that decision.  So, I’m not going to comment on that.  That is obviously the Speaker’s privilege to — to speak for himself and what he sees.

So, look, I would say, more broadly — and I said this moments ago — this is a deeply painful, painful moment for many communities, and we understand that.  But the President believes that free speech, debate, and nondiscrimination on college campuses are important.  They’re important American values.  And that — and so, he’ll always be very clear — we will always be very clear about here — about that here. 

But, you know, protests must be peaceful.  You know, students must be safe.  When we see violent rhetoric, we have to call that out.  When we see physical intimidation or grotesque antisemitic remarks, we have to speak that out.  And you saw that from the President’s statement when he — this President’s statement on Passover.  He talked about that.  He talked about action — taking action and making sure that we’re calling that out. 

So, we’re going to continue to do that forcefully, condemn antisemitism from this administration.  We’re going to contem- — continue to do that.  We’re implementing, as you know, the — the first-ever National Strategic Effort to Counter Antisemitism because there should be no place in this country in — when it relates to that type of hate. 

We saw what happened in 2017, Charlottesville.  That was one of the reasons that this President decided to run in 2020.  He ran in 2020 because of what he saw in Charlottesville and what was happening in the streets of Charlottesville — -ville, the vile, just hateful rhetoric that we’re seeing there. 

So, I think Columbia is going to have to speak to their personnel issues.  And what we will speak to is, more broadly, what we expect and what we want to see and how painful it is for many communities here. 

Q    And then on TikTok.  Now that the President has signed the bill, does the White House have a preference as to whether TikTok gets sold and remains operational in the U.S.?  Or are you indifferent about whether it gets banned or sold?

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  Well, first of all, we’ve been very clear, members of Congress have been very clear, we do not want to see a ban.  This is not about a ban.  This is about divestment, selling — right? — being sold.  This is about our national con- — security.  This is not concerns about Americans using TikTok.  This is about PRC ownership, right?  This is about the control of TikTok. 

And so, want to be super, super clear.  And so, that’s what members of Congress moved forward with.  That’s what we supported.  So, we wanted to see a divestment.  We want it to be — to see it being sold.  And we do not — we do not seek a ban.  That is not what this bill is about — or this now law is about, canceling it.

Q    Thanks, Karine.  You say it’s not about a ban.  But the reality is — is that finding a buyer for TikTok will be incredibly difficult, and the Chinese government also could intervene and block a sale.  So, if it came to it, would the administration, then, support a ban, as the legislation is written?

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  So, here’s — here’s — I think I want to be — as it relates to China, they should allow it.  Right?  They should allow it to be sold.  That’s what I’ll say there. 

As it relates to the bill — the law now — there’s time.  We got to see how this plays out.  We believe that it is possible.  There are already American investors who are — who are willing and are interested in buying TikTok.  So, the interest is there.  It’s not like there isn’t any. 

And so, we’re going to see.  There’s time — there’s time — there’s certainly time on the books to see how this plays out.  We do not — this — this is not a ban.  Again, this is about divestment.  And that’s what we want to see.

Q    Which American investors are interested?

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  I mean, you all have reported on it.  There’s reports out — out there that there’s a number of interested buyers — a number of them.  You guys have reported on that.  I don’t have a list to share. 

So, we’re going to let that process play out.  But it’s been reported by all of you. 

Q    And just what’s the President’s personal reaction to what he’s seeing playing out on these college campuses?  What would he — be his message to those who are peacefully — peacefully protesting, you know, those who feel targeted on —

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  Yeah, I —

Q    — you know, all sides of the community?

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  No, I hear your question.  I think the President has been very clear.  He’s put out — he put out a statement.  In his Passover statement, he talked about the — it is — we can’t be silent here.  Silent is complicit.  And we can’t allow that. 

We sh- — we believe in First Amendment rights, right?  We believe in people being able to express themselves in a peaceful manner.  But when we’re talking about hateful rhetoric, when we’re talking about violence, we have to call that out.  We have to call that. 

And we’ve been consistent here throughout this administration.  The President has been consistent about it, obviously, since 2017, but even before that, when he saw what happened in Charlottesville.  We have to call out hateful, violent rhetoric. 

But, you know, we want to make sure that people have the opportunity to peacefully protest — peacefully protest. 

Go ahead.

Q    Karine, on that subject, President Biden once talked about the Vietnam War protests of his youth.  And he said the reason why he didn’t participate was because, quote, “I wore sport coats…  I am who I am.  I’m not big on flak jackets and tie-dye shirts.  And, you know, that’s not me.” 

Is that still his view about the protest movements?  Or does he see them as — as useful in shaping policy or shaping a discourse?

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  Look, obviously, the President, when he was talking about that, he was talking about the Vietnam War.  That was a moment in time — a specific — you know, when he was younger and how he felt about that situation. 

And as President, you know, as Commander-in-Chief, where he sits right now, behind that Resolute Desk, and what he understands, it’s important to speak out.  And he understands that, as a leader in this country, that when we see this type of antisemitic hate, this type of antisemitic vile — vile, we have to be very clear.  We have to show moral clarity.  We have to call that out. 

And I said this at the beginning: Students should feel safe, communities should feel safe, and we — you know, we can’t — we can’t stay silent.  Obviously, it is a deeply painful moment.  He sees that.  He understands that.  And he will always support and believes in free speech and debate and nondiscrimination on college campuses, as I said moments ago. 

And so — but we have to be able to do this and protest in a peaceful way.  I don’t think that takes away from the comments that you just made, that — that you just gave back to me that the Pros- — President made.  I don’t think that — that that’s any different — right? — than what the President is saying right now.  Right?

You have to be able to — be able to peacefully protest, but you got to call out hate.  You got to call out hate. 

Q    And then on TikTok.  Is there any expectation that China could retaliate against U.S. techni- — tech companies that are operating there?

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  I mean, look, I can’t speak for — for the Chi- — the Chinese government.  I can’t.  I mean, that’s a hypothetical.  I can’t speak to that.

I can only speak to the importance of this — this law moving forward — this bill moving forward — obviously, the President signed it to- — signed today, so it’s now law — and the importance of making sure that we move forward with that divestment of TikTok.

We’re talking about national security.  We’re talking about making sure we’re protecting Americans’ privacy, and that’s what this is about.  And we are not talking about Americans using TikTok.  That’s not what we’re — we’re looking at here. 

We want to make sure that there’s a divestment, that, you know, TikTok should not be owned — or Americans should not be — should not be having to worry about using a platform that is owned by — you know, by a country that’s trying to harm us.  That’s the national security concern here.

Q    And will this law survive a constitutional challenge?

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  Look, I’m not going to speak to that.  I mean, I think that’s something that, obviously, DOJ will — will deal with.  I can’t speak to — to challenges.  But obviously, it’s — it’s law now.  So, we’re going to move forward with it.

Go ahead.

Q    Thank you.  We are seeing some of these on-campus protests really heighten tensions and escalation across the country, not just at Columbia but public universities — UT Austin, USC in California.  Is there any concern about how law enforcement is handling these protesters?

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  I mean, look, I can’t speak to what’s going on on the ground.  I know what UT — what happened is just happening now, happening today.  So, I have no idea on how — how that’s being — how that’s being dealt on the ground. 

But, look, we’ve been very clear.  We want to see this be peaceful.  We understand it’s deeply concerning.  It is important that — that communities feel safe and important that students feel safe.  That’s what we want to see.  It should not be violent.  It should not be hateful rhetoric here. 

And so, that’s what we’re going to keep saying, keep calling on.  And — and we’ll let the universities handle that process on how they’re — how they’re dealing on the ground.

Q    Thank you.  And if I may shift back to Ukraine for just a moment.

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  Yeah.

Q    President Zelenskyy said he and President Biden discussed this Global Peace Summit coming up this June in Switzerland on their call this week.  What is the White House view at this point on what that summit could achieve?  And would the President consider attending?

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  So, nothing to share with you on the President’s schedule.  Obviously, it’s an important conversation that Ukraine should be part of.  We have always been very clear about that.  I don’t have anything to share beyond — beyond that.  I think, you know, this is something that Pres- — the President of — the President of Ukraine — obviously, President Zelenskyy needs to lead on and — and speak to.  I just don’t have anything else to share. 

Obviously, we have shown our commitment to the great people of Ukraine as it relates to defending themselves against Russia’s aggression.  We’ve been pretty consistent about that.  And we believe that we need to do everything that we can to make sure that they have what they need to fight for their democracy, to fight for their freedom.  And we believe that they will prevail. 

I’m just not going to get ahead of — of a potential summit and what that might look like.

Go ahead, Tolu.

Q    Thanks, Karine.  Two questions.  First, the President expressed some regret about the border security bill not being a part of the supplemental.  But he also said that he will address that another time, another place.  Do you have any update on whether the President is —

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  And I also think, like, Mitch McConnell made a statement about it as well.  So, I would certainly point you to what he said about the border security bill.  And I think that’s important — right? — because we need — this is a bipartisan effort, and we need both sides. 

Look, the President has been very clear.  We need that bipartisan border security n- — bill — or the negotiation that came together on that, and we have to move forward with it.  It came out of the Senate.  It w- — it got bipartisan support.

We heard from the former President, who said, “Don’t move forward.”  He told Republicans to reject it.  They did.  And that’s unfortunate.  That’s unfortunate.

Because it would have been the toughest, it would have been the fairest if it was — if the President had an opportunity to sign that into law — you know, law that we had seen in some time.  And it would have addressed a lot of the concerns that Republicans have that we’re seeing — the challenges that we’re seeing at the border. 

So, I mean, he had an opportunity.  You all — you all listened to the President, right?  So, he had an opportunity this morning, so he was going to take that opportunity to say how we need to continue to move forward with the border — border — border security negotiation — or the plan that came out of the negotiation.  So, he wants to see that.

It’s — it’s a concern that majority of Americans have.  And so, we want to see that move forward.  And I think Mitch McConnell spoke for himself on that.

MR. MICHEL:  Karine —

Q    Should we —

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  I know.

Q    — interpret him saying he’s going to come back to it as a sign that he’s going to do some executive action in the coming weeks?

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  Oh, well, look, we’ve always been very clear.  No executive action is actually going to do what that border — border security plan would have done.  Right?  We believe that was a — in order to move forward to deal with the challenges at the border, in order to actually deal with what we’ve been seeing with immigration — a broken immigration system that has been — that we’ve seen for decades — that’s the way to move forward.

Obviously, we’re always going to look at our options.  But we believe there’s still an opportunity here.  There’s still an opportunity here.  And I think — I think Leader McConnell was — was pretty clear about that, too, today.  And —

Q    Then —

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  Go ahead, go ahead.  I have to —

Q    A really quick one on — on taxes.  The President earlier today said the 2017 tax bill that was passed under President Trump — if he is reelected — if President Biden is reelected, it would be dead and gone forever.

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  Yeah.

Q    That bill obviously included tax cuts for the wealthy, but it also included tax cuts across the board to the tax rates at various levels of income.

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  Yeah.

Q    Is the President saying that he would get rid of the entire tax bill and not allow those tax cuts to continue?

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  I think — I think what the President was trying to say — he was trying to make very clear that that was — the 2017 tax bill was something that was for, you know, billionaires and corporations.  And that’s not what he’s for.  Right?  He wants to — he wants to make sure that the working class gets their fair share.  He wants to make sure that the billionaires and corporations pay — right? — what they — what they owe. 

And so, he’s talking about an economy — what type of economy that he wants to build.  You hear us say it all the time.  He says it all the time: an economy from that — that’s built from the bottom up, middle out, that doesn’t leave out working people, that doesn’t leave out the middle class, that builds into the middle class.  And I think that’s what he was trying to speak to more broadly and how billionaires and corporations have to pay their fair share.  He’s always been very clear about that. 

And 2017 tax bill does not do that.  It does the opposite of that.  And that’s what we’ve seen from Republicans continuing — like, when they put out their budget recently, that’s what they’re doing.  They want to give them a break. 

And what the President wants to do is give the middle class a break.  He wants to give working people a break.  And you — you’ve seen that from his legis- — from legislation that’s been passed and trying to — and trying to make sure that we do not leave communities behind, communities have been behind — left behind for decades now.

Go ahead, Peter.  I have to go into the Oval Office.

Q    Understood.  I’ll a- — I’ll ask two quick ones, one that developed in —

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  Yeah.

Q    — the last hour, which is: On the third attempt in the last three weeks, Arizona state House lawmakers just passed a bill that would repeal the near-total ban on abortion in Arizona.  The White House’s view on that?  It now, of course, moves to the state senate.

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  Okay.  So, look, we’ve — you’ve heard us talk about the 1864 law and how it just sets us back — 1864.  We’re in 2024.  And there’s a law that — that they wanted to move forward with that obviously would hurt women, would hurt — hurt our reproductive rights and hurt — hurt our — obviously, women to make a decision about their healthcare.

And so, if this is — I have not seen that report.  But if this is the case —

Q    It is the case.

MS. JEAN-PIERRE: — that it has been repealed in one of the chambers, that’s a good thing.  Right?  We’re moving forward in the right direction.  We’re moving forward to where we are today in 2024, where we should be protecting our freedom, protecting a woman’s right to make a very personal decision about her body.

Q    And then, last one, quickly.  I know you’ve got to go.

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  Yeah.

Q    But the President didn’t mention the words TikTok — or maybe that’s one word, TikTok, with no space between the two — in his comments earlier today.  (Laughter.)  So, if you had an elevator —

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  (Laughs.)  That’s so precise.

Q    If you had an elevator pitch, there was 170 million Americans who use TikTok right now, what is the simple statement to those Americans right now who are saying, “The President of the United States just proposed — or signed legislation that could ban a platform that I rely on, in some cases, for my livelihood”?

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  I think I would just say what I’ve been repeating here from this podium for the past few minutes here, which is: This is not a ban.  This is about divestment.  This is about our national security.  We are not saying that Americans — we do not want Americans to use TikTok.  That is not what we’re saying.  We want to make sure that Americans are protected — are protected.  And that is what this is about. 

And so, we believe this law will get us there.  We believe that we will be able to divest — that TikTok will be able to divest.  We believe that there is interest in — in folks who want to buy TikTok, and we want to get there.  We want to get there.

This is — the President wants to protect Americans.  He w- — he wants to protect Americans’ privacy.  He wants to protect Americans from coun- — a country, in this — in this instance, that wants to potentially do us harm.  And that’s what he believes is important. 

We’re not saying we do not want TikTok to exist.  We’re not saying that we do not want Americans to use TikTok.  We want to make sure that it’s done in a way that we protect our national security and that we protect Americans.

Q    Thank you.

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  All right.  All right, everybody.

Q    Thanks, Karine.

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  I’ve got to go to the Oval.

Thanks, everybody.  Have a good — have a good week.  I guess I’ll see you in New York.

Q    Karine, if there are any pictures of the President with Edan, if you would share those before the newscast —

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  I’ll — I’ll check.

Q    — tonight, we’d be grateful.

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  I’ll check in.

Q    Thank you.

MS. JEAN-PIERRE:  I’ll check in.  Thanks.  Thank you.

   3:49 P.M. EDT

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Washington, D.C.

Thank you, Maria.

You give me hope too.

It’s what you do.

In Alzheimer’s, you’ve given others hope during some of their darkest times – even as you were going though yours – shining your light so others can find their way forward.

And you’re giving so many women hope.

Just look at this incredible center at the Cleveland Clinic, and all the women and families whose lives will be changed because of you.

In this moment, I can’t help but think of your mother – who changed so many lives of her own. You carry forward her legacy – fighting for the health of our nation and the planet, always looking for the best way to make the biggest difference for the most people. And with each mark you make on the world, you gift us with a little of her light and her love too.

I know all of us are so thankful. And I think she would be so proud.

Her tenacity is a part of you. Because when you set your mind to something – you don’t back down.

I’ve seen it myself – it’s why I’m here today.

Yes, it all started with that meeting Maria talked about.

I’d met you as second lady, when you were First Lady of California. But we had never sat down like that – never talked about what was on our hearts.

You laid out a problem that was so simple – but so often ignored: that women’s health is understudied and research is underfunded. And too many of our medications, treatments, and medical school textbooks are based on men.

This has created gaps in our understanding of conditions that mostly affect women, only affect women, or affect women and men differently, leaving women seeking health care in a medical world largely designed for men.

It was one of those moments that happen in life, where you learn something and you can never see the world the same way again.

Suddenly, the problem almost felt obvious – because we all know it.

If you ask any woman in America about her healthcare, she probably has a story to tell. You know her.

She’s the woman who gets debilitating migraines, but doesn’t know why, and can’t find treatment options that work for her.

She’s the woman going through menopause, who visits her doctor and leaves with more questions than answers, even though half the country will go through menopause at some point in their lives.

She’s the woman whose heart attack isn’t recognized because her symptoms don’t look like a man’s, even as heart disease is the leading cause of death among women.

As I’ve traveled to research centers and conferences and universities, I’ve shared this with the people I meet. And I see the nods each time – as women, and men, have the same realization I had with Maria.

But it’s not enough to just talk about it. President Biden and I knew we had to work to change this.

That’s why Joe has pushed forward all those pieces that may not have seemed possible before: The first White House Initiative on Women’s Health Research, requesting $12 billion from Congress in his State of the Union, signing an Executive Order to make sure that when the government funds research, that work includes women from the beginning. And ensuring that when we make discoveries, those ideas get to the women and families waiting for answers.

And, as part of the initiative, ARPA-H – the agency Joe created to pursue breakthrough health research at lighting speed – launched a “sprint” for women’s health. That means this year, the agency will invest millions to push forward innovations that could be life-changing for women.

All of you have been a part of work like this on Alzheimer’s and other diseases. You’ve poured in resources. You’ve pushed science forward. You’ve changed how we talk about this disease. You’ve seen the power of conversations like the one Maria and I had – how they ripple outwards, reshaping our world.

All of you can create those ripples too – can take what you’ve learned here and share it, can find ways to shift the world. 

Because, if this is the difference one year can make, imagine where we will be this time next year – or the year after…or in 10 years!

There is so much more for us to discover – lives that could be transformed, or even saved. Families that could find the answers they need. Patients who no longer have to struggle with pain or confusion – who could get a second chance at life, not only women, but men too. Because these discoveries could give us insight into all of us. 

That’s the power of research: to investigate and innovate, to help and heal, to build a better health care system – one that places women and their lived experiences at its center.

Thank you for being a part of this work.

Together, we will write new stories about women’s health care. Ones where women leave doctors’ offices with more answers than questions. Where no woman or girl has to hear that, “it’s all in your head,” or, “it’s just stress” ever again. Where women don’t just survive, they lead long, healthy, and happy lives.

Thank you.

###

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Washington, D.C.

Thank you, Maria.

You give me hope too.

It’s what you do.

In Alzheimer’s, you’ve given others hope during some of their darkest times – even as you were going though yours – shining your light so others can find their way forward.

And you’re giving so many women hope.

Just look at this incredible center at the Cleveland Clinic, and all the women and families whose lives will be changed because of you.

In this moment, I can’t help but think of your mother – who changed so many lives of her own. You carry forward her legacy – fighting for the health of our nation and the planet, always looking for the best way to make the biggest difference for the most people. And with each mark you make on the world, you gift us with a little of her light and her love too.

I know all of us are so thankful. And I think she would be so proud.

Her tenacity is a part of you. Because when you set your mind to something – you don’t back down.

I’ve seen it myself – it’s why I’m here today.

Yes, it all started with that meeting Maria talked about.

I’d met you as second lady, when you were First Lady of California. But we had never sat down like that – never talked about what was on our hearts.

You laid out a problem that was so simple – but so often ignored: that women’s health is understudied and research is underfunded. And too many of our medications, treatments, and medical school textbooks are based on men.

This has created gaps in our understanding of conditions that mostly affect women, only affect women, or affect women and men differently, leaving women seeking health care in a medical world largely designed for men.

It was one of those moments that happen in life, where you learn something and you can never see the world the same way again.

Suddenly, the problem almost felt obvious – because we all know it.

If you ask any woman in America about her healthcare, she probably has a story to tell. You know her.

She’s the woman who gets debilitating migraines, but doesn’t know why, and can’t find treatment options that work for her.

She’s the woman going through menopause, who visits her doctor and leaves with more questions than answers, even though half the country will go through menopause at some point in their lives.

She’s the woman whose heart attack isn’t recognized because her symptoms don’t look like a man’s, even as heart disease is the leading cause of death among women.

As I’ve traveled to research centers and conferences and universities, I’ve shared this with the people I meet. And I see the nods each time – as women, and men, have the same realization I had with Maria.

But it’s not enough to just talk about it. President Biden and I knew we had to work to change this.

That’s why Joe has pushed forward all those pieces that may not have seemed possible before: The first White House Initiative on Women’s Health Research, requesting $12 billion from Congress in his State of the Union, signing an Executive Order to make sure that when the government funds research, that work includes women from the beginning. And ensuring that when we make discoveries, those ideas get to the women and families waiting for answers.

And, as part of the initiative, ARPA-H – the agency Joe created to pursue breakthrough health research at lighting speed – launched a “sprint” for women’s health. That means this year, the agency will invest millions to push forward innovations that could be life-changing for women.

All of you have been a part of work like this on Alzheimer’s and other diseases. You’ve poured in resources. You’ve pushed science forward. You’ve changed how we talk about this disease. You’ve seen the power of conversations like the one Maria and I had – how they ripple outwards, reshaping our world.

All of you can create those ripples too – can take what you’ve learned here and share it, can find ways to shift the world. 

Because, if this is the difference one year can make, imagine where we will be this time next year – or the year after…or in 10 years!

There is so much more for us to discover – lives that could be transformed, or even saved. Families that could find the answers they need. Patients who no longer have to struggle with pain or confusion – who could get a second chance at life, not only women, but men too. Because these discoveries could give us insight into all of us. 

That’s the power of research: to investigate and innovate, to help and heal, to build a better health care system – one that places women and their lived experiences at its center.

Thank you for being a part of this work.

Together, we will write new stories about women’s health care. Ones where women leave doctors’ offices with more answers than questions. Where no woman or girl has to hear that, “it’s all in your head,” or, “it’s just stress” ever again. Where women don’t just survive, they lead long, healthy, and happy lives.

Thank you.

###

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The South Lawn

Thank you, Sharona.

It takes incredible courage to not only heal, but to also share your journey so that others can heal too. It’s that same bravery you called on when you chose to put on the uniform and protect others.

Thank you and your daughter for your service.

Every time the President’s Own play, you fill the hearts of all who hear you with pride – and today is no different. Let’s give the Marine Band another round of applause for that incredible rendition of our National Anthem. 

Warriors never ride alone.

That’s the promise of the Wounded Warrior Project – and, as you can see today: it’s true.

Because this isn’t a race. It’s a ride.

It’s not about how fast you can go or leaving people in your dust. It’s about riding as one.

And there’s a magic when you come together. In every look, laugh, encouraging word, or maybe a smile, you pull each other through the pedals, the miles, the days.

Recovery isn’t a race either. You don’t succeed by going faster. Some days you may even feel like you aren’t moving at all. There are challenges that never seem to go away. But warriors find a way forward, together. Because healing is not a straight line. It’s a journey that continues – and at some point, maybe today – you look back and realize just how far you’ve come.

And it’s not just you.

Beside the riders here, there are families.

You – military spouses and kids – may not have worn a uniform, but you serve our country too. Missions may end – wars may come to a close – but the sacrifices that your families make endure.

The Bidens are a military family.

My father was a Navy Signalman in World War II. And our son, Major Beau Biden, served for a year in Iraq as part of the Delaware Army National Guard.

So, as a military mom, and as your First Lady, I want to let you know how much all of you mean to me and to your Commander-in-Chief, President Biden.

The United States doesn’t demand military service of our citizens – you step forward: everyday heroes who sacrifice your own safety, willingly and proudly, so that others can be free.

You represent the best of this country. And you and your families deserve nothing less than our unconditional respect and support.

That’s what Joining Forces – my White House initiative to support military and veteran families, caregivers, and survivors – is all about.

And so many of you have been with us from the beginning – have become old friends. It’s great to see you again. Thank you for your ideas, your hard work, and your collaboration. It’s what has allowed us to make so much incredible progress over the last three years:

An historic Executive Order that expands veterans’ access to high-quality, home-based care, which Joe signed last year. He got the PACT Act done, which means more benefits and health care for veterans harmed by toxins. His Administration is investing a record amount in free mental health services for veterans. He’s removing barriers to employment for military spouses, and pushing the private sector to hire veterans and military spouses. And he’s working to end veteran homelessness and prevent veteran suicide.

My husband often says that we have many obligations as a nation, but only one sacred obligation: to support you and your families when we send you into harm’s way, and when you return.

As President – and as a military dad – he never loses sight of that conviction.

That’s why he’s working tirelessly to make sure you and your families have what you need to thrive.

Today, and every day, we ride with you – your President, your nation, and all of us here.

With all my heart, thank you for your service and sacrifice.

May God bless our military and veteran families, caregivers, and survivors.

Now, it’s time to begin your ride!

###

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