Oversight Hearing on "Now Ore Never: The Importance of Domestic Mining for U.S. National Security"
2025-02-06
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Source: Congress.gov
Summary
This congressional hearing focused on the urgent need to secure domestic critical mineral supply chains to protect U.S. national security and economic stability. Key participants emphasized that the United States imports over 50% of its critical minerals, with China controlling 60% of global production and 90% of processing. The hearing detailed how China manipulates global markets through export bans and price dumping, while highlighting long-standing permitting delays and regulatory overreach that extend mine development timelines to 29 years. Witnesses advocated for reform of outdated laws like the 1872 mining law, expanded royalty payments, improved permitting, and increased investment in domestic refining and recycling. The discussion underscored the importance of re-evaluating mineral lists, strengthening tribal consultation, and leveraging strategic partnerships to ensure U.S. competitiveness in a global mineral market dominated by China.
Participants
Transcript
important mining projects, including those in my district. In fact, the Biden administration finally acted at the 11th hour last month on Perpetua's Stibnite Gold project that we will be discussing today, only after China announced a mineral export ban, forcing the Pentagon to plead with the White House to approve the project. This project should have been approved years ago, and the Biden administration's failure to do so earlier has put our country's national security at risk. Given the importance of these minerals and their existence throughout the United States, it is astonishing that we rely so heavily on imports. The US Geological Survey's own figures show that the United States is forced to import more than 50% of the minerals on its critical minerals list. Wildly, we import 100% of nearly a quarter of minerals that we list as critical. Worse yet, our close allies are not the nations upon which we rely for these key commodities. Most notably, China controls approximately 60% of global critical minerals production, 90% of processing, and 75% of manufacturing. According to the International Energy Agency's 2024 Global Critical Minerals Outlook, by 2030, Indonesia is also projected to control 62% of global nickel mining, and the Democratic Republic of Congo will account for 66% of cobalt mining, where they mine cobalt using child slave labor, and that's a fact. Many of these mines are directly financed by China. which was a point highlighted in a recent report compiled by AidData at the College of William and Mary.
According to the report between 2000 and 2021, Chinese financial institutions provided nearly $57 billion in loans to 19 low and middle income countries, including copper and cobalt from the Democrat Republic of Congo and Peru and nickel from Indonesia. Not only does Chinese mineral dominance enable worldwide labor and human rights abuses, including child and forced labor, but it also gives the Communist country of China a stranglehold on America's economic and our national security. Two months ago, China announced the ban of critical mineral exports to the United States to include antimony, gallium, germanium, and other dual-use minerals vital for both civilian and defense applications. China also has a long track record of strategically dumping its products onto global markets in order to stifle our attempts to build out secure mineral supply chains. And just this week, the CCP placed new expert controls on five additional minerals that are key components in a range of industries from energy development to cell phones to infrared missiles. Our reliance on foreign critical minerals is completely unacceptable. Yet, rather than heed the call of House Republicans to combat our nation's failure to secure domestic critical mineral supply chains, former President Biden chose to kneecap America by canceling decades-old mineral leases and withdrawing hundreds of thousands of mineral-rich acres in states like Minnesota, Arizona, and New Mexico, among others. But our self-inflicted wounds do not end there. A recent S&P Global study revealed that it takes an average of 29 years for a critical mineral project to progress from the discovery of the mineral to production in the United States.
The only country in this world that takes longer to open up a mine is in Zambia. This absurd. absurd timeline is driven by high cost and uncertainty from permitting delays and the risk of litigation initiated by radical anti-mining groups. Fortunately, on the first day of his second term, President Trump signed an executive order titled Unleashing American Energy, which directs federal agencies to review and revise or revoke any agency actions that potentially burden the development of domestic energy sources, including critical and other hard rock minerals. This committee looks forward to working with the Trump administration to realize a golden age of American domestic critical mineral dominance. And I hope that my colleagues on both sides of the aisle will join me today for a dynamic discussion about the importance of critical minerals to our economic, and our national security and how we can secure domestic critical mineral supply chains to propel us towards a brighter future. I want to thank the witnesses again for their willingness to testify today and I look forward to hearing about how we can assure our national security by ensuring mineral security. And now I want to yield to my new ranking colleague, Representative Ansari, for her opening statement. And Representative, it's great to have you on this committee.
It is great to join you. I'm thrilled to be here today and I'm honored to serve as the ranking member of the Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources this Congress. I look forward to working collaboratively and in a bipartisan way to get things done whenever possible. I was drawn to the Energy and Mineral Resources Subcommittee because we're handling issues that touch the daily lives of all of our constituents. When we in Congress make decisions about mining and energy development, it impacts everything from jobs to the cost of energy to the quality of the air that we breathe and the water that we drink. And of course, if we are addressing the climate crisis or making it worse. My constituents sent me to Washington, D.C., to fight for them for clean air, clean water, lower prices and safe places to live, work and play. Arizonans know too well what it's like to live with the impacts of climate change. The communities I represent are on the front lines, facing unprecedented extreme heat and water scarcity. In fact, hundreds of Arizonans die every summer as a result of extreme heat. And this is driven by our dependence on polluting fossil fuels, which puts our well-being at the whims of big oil companies and their billionaire allies. This dependence must end. It won't be easy, but we can and we must transition to a clean energy economy. This transition relies on materials like copper, lithium, and cobalt to build the transition lines, batteries, solar panels, and wind turbines that we need. During my time on the Phoenix City Council, I served as a councilwoman and vice mayor of the city, fifth largest city in the country. I led the charge to electrify our city fleets, invest in renewable energy, and fast track the transition to clean electric vehicles.
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