July 20, 2022

Congress’ big swing at China’s economic and geopolitical ambitions turned out to be mostly a whiff.

The Senate is poised to abandon months of work on legislation overhauling U.S. policy toward Beijing when, as soon as this week, it approves a drastically slimmed-down bill to boost domestic semiconductor manufacturing. It will do so without a firm guarantee that those tough-on-China provisions left on the cutting-room floor will ever become law.

The resulting legislation aims to address the nationwide microchip shortage by spurring domestic production, a pivotal step to depriving China of U.S. dollars, and is poised to include vital research-related provisions. But the failure of the initial vision for the bill has left Democrats and Republicans frustrated at their inability to come together on an enduring strategy to address what they see as the biggest long-term threat to U.S. national security.

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