Senate vote on semiconductor bill delayed due to weather

The long-delayed Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors (CHIPS) for America Act, which would provide $52 billion to the domestic semiconductor industry and $81 billion to the National Science Foundation, was postponed another day after severe thunderstorms delayed senators’ return to Washington on Monday.  

The Senate was supposed to vote at 5:30 p.m. Monday on a motion to end debate on the bill, which would have set up a final vote on Tuesday.  

But now it will be pushed back a day after senators got hung up at airports as severe weather moved across the mid-Atlantic and heavy rains doused Washington, D.C. 

“The Senate had planned to move forward to end the debate on the bipartisan CHIPS and innovation bill. Unfortunately a number of storms on the East Coast disrupted the plans of a significant number of senators,” Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) announced. 

Schumer said he would postpone the procedural vote until 11 a.m. Tuesday to give colleagues more time to get back to town safely. This means final passage of the bill will be delayed until Wednesday.  

“I remain hopeful that we can remain on track to finish this legislation ASAP,” he said.  

Schumer said that in the meantime he would file a motion to advance legislation to help military veterans suffering from toxic exposure, the Sgt. 1st Class Heath Robinson Honoring our PACT Act. The legislation needs to pass the Senate again because of what the leader described as “a technical error.”  

This means the Senate won’t act on a resolution to ratify Sweden’s and Finland’s accession to NATO until next week at the earliest. It’s a high priority of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who visited both countries in May.  

A Republican senator backing the CHIPS bill said the postponed flights due to bad weather made it uncertain whether there would be 60 votes to advance it to a final vote.