Biden-⁠Harris Administration Releases Final Guidance to Bolster American-Made Goods in Federal Infrastructure Projects

By Livia Shmavonian, Made in America Director

President Biden’s Investing in America agenda is driving a manufacturing and clean energy boom, rebuilding America’s infrastructure, lowering costs, and creating good-paying jobs. His plan—Bidenomics—is rooted in the recognition that the best way to grow the economy is from the middle out and the bottom up. This includes rebuilding our roads and bridges using Made in America materials, built by workers across America. And it’s transforming our country for the better – reaching communities in every corner of the United States, including those that have too often been left behind.

During the State of the Union address, President Biden committed to ensuring construction materials used in federally funded infrastructure projects are made in America. Today, delivering on the President’s commitments, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) released final guidance to boost the use of American-made goods in infrastructure projects — which will bolster American businesses, workers, and economic growth.

The final guidance will support implementation of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law’s (BIL) statutory requirements that manufactured products, construction materials, and iron and steel used in federally funded infrastructure projects are Made in America. It also sets forth these standards for construction materials while serving as a guide to agencies in using taxpayer dollars to strengthen our economy by supporting the creation of good jobs in both construction and manufacturing by expanding domestic production through infrastructure investment.

When President Biden signed the BIL, it represented a once-in-a-generation investment in our nation’s infrastructure, creating a historic opportunity to invest in American industry and workers by strengthening Made in America standards. The law, which includes the Build America, Buy America Act (BABA), significantly expanded these standards to require that federally funded infrastructure projects use American-made iron, steel, construction materials, and manufactured products. That means taxpayer dollars funding our country’s infrastructure projects are invested back in American jobs and manufacturing.

Since the bill’s passage, the Biden-Harris Administration has made significant progress rebuilding our roads and bridges, making public transportation accessible, investing in clean infrastructure, upgrading power grids to transmit clean energy, and more – with 37,000 projects funded and counting already. And we’re seeing the results. Since the President took office, over 13 million new jobs have been created, including 800,000 new manufacturing jobs nationwide. More than a half a trillion dollars in outside private investment has been made in manufacturing and clean energy, which is already helping grow our economy. The factory construction of today means manufacturing jobs for tomorrow and, currently, spending on construction of manufacturing plants has nearly doubled in the last two years after growing only two percent during the previous four years.

The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the Chips and Science Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act are spurring investments across the country – and thanks to the Build America Buy America Act we’re not simply buying those products, we’re making them here at home.

For additional information on this final guidance, click here.

Final Guidance text available here.