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Former US military leaders put pressure on the congress to reject a republican thrust to repeal billions of dollars of tax credits for critical minerals, warning that it would leave the country vulnerable to China.
A group of 23 general retirement generals and admirals asked Jason Smith, president of the House Ways and Means Committee, to protect five tax loss covering advanced manufacturing, clean vehicles and electricity production. The committee should vote on the fate of certain credits next week.
The former military leaders are members of Safe, a group focused on Critical minerals And energy security which is funded by donors ranging from charities to the US industry and government. They include Admiral Dennis Blair, former director of national intelligence, and General Joseph Dunford, 19th president of the joint staff chiefs.
The combat of gathering underlines the unusual political alliances around the law on the reduction of inflation of the Biden era, which has provided lucrative incentives green energy and critical mineral projects.
The law attracts the support of industry and even of certain Republicans whose districts benefit from the resulting projects. Meanwhile, environmental groups protested mineral extraction, citing wildlife, water and ecological concerns.
Companies have launched a lobbying campaign of several million dollars aimed at saving the Will go Since Donald Trump has won the November presidential election. He described the legislation of “new green scam” and promised to repeal it with the help of republicans in the congress. The president wants to use the savings generated by removing legislation to finance the expected tax cuts from his administration.
The repeal of IRA fiscal reductions could affect some of the 20 projects of critical minerals recently accelerated by the Trump administration. These include lithium projects supported by standard lithium and the Equinor in Arkansas and Albemarle in Nevada. Critical minerals such as cobalt, nickel and lithium are essential in electronic equipment such as wind turbines, electric vehicle engines, rechargeable batteries and military equipment.
Some republican members of the Congress have called on party colleagues to “fully repeal” the law, claiming that this could cost taxpayers for a decade and support renewable energy sources while moving fossil fuels.
Lobbying follows concerns raised By the Ministry of Defense this year on the “disruption of the critical supply chains of China” by restricting exports of rare land and the equipment used to treat them.
In a letter to Smith and the leaders of the Chamber and the Senate, the generals said that the reduction of credits would threaten $ 125 billion in investments in essential critical minerals to the defense industries. This would put 100,000 direct jobs in danger in 15 states and create opportunities for companies related to the Chinese Communist Party in order to increase their global market share of key industries, they maintain.
“The abrogation or weakening of these provisions would not only block the growth of critical industries – it would leave the United States vulnerable to the handling of the supply chain by hostile regimes and would delay additional efforts to reconstruct the industrial defense base of the country,” said the letter.
Trump has already targeted spending under the law by ordering all federal agencies to “immediately suspend the disbursement of funds under IRA”. But the future of IRA ultimately depends on a vote in the congress, which adopted the legislation in 2022 under a budgetary resolution. This means that only a simple majority vote in the House and the Senate is necessary to repeal it, without the possibilities of filibusier.
The Republicans have majorities in the two chambers of the congress, but the supporters of the IRA hope that certain members of the party will oppose the repeal of tax reductions, which support jobs in their constituencies.
On Thursday, a dozen republican legislators wrote a letter to Smith, arguing that tax credits will be important for republican states with major clean electrical projects, nuclear energy and battery storage, according to Reuters. However, legislators said it was “not unreasonable” to incorporate elimination of credits.
“The IRA will almost certainly survive its current form,” said Frank Maisano, partner of the Braswell policies and resolution group, a law and lobbying cabinet. “There will probably be certain articles, such as the Sunset arrangements added to end certain tax credits earlier than expected, among other changes.”
