OF NOTE: The Sphere Podcast is back!

PolicySphere Publisher Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry interviews Harry Moser of the Reshoring Initiative. Harry received a BS and MS in mechanical engineering from MIT, and an MBA from the University of Chicago (so serious degrees from serious schools), and became CEO of an American manufacturer of machine tools. This gave him a front row seat to the hollowing-out of American manufacturing. After retiring, rather than sip pina coladas on a beach somewhere, he decided to do something about it, and founded the Reshoring Initiative, a non-profit that helps American companies reshore manufacturing and advocates for American manufacturing. We love the Reshoring Initiative because it's much more than a think tank; its "customers" are not politicians or donors but actual real-world manufacturing businesses.

Pascal and Harry discuss the Reshoring Initiative's recent survey of American manufacturers, and go over everything the Trump Administration has done on trade and manufacturing since January, awarding merits and demerits.

Watch the episode on YouTube, Spotify, or Apple Podcasts.

Subscribe to the Sphere Podcast on YouTube, Spotify, or Apple Podcasts.

ALSO OF NOTE: Opinion: How The Trump Administration Can Take Over The Ivy League

Previously on PolicySphere Articles:

→ Manhattan Institute Publishes Great New Manifesto On Higher Education

→ Opinion: Five Reasons Why Even A Temporary Amnesty Or Guest Worker Program Is A Very Bad Idea

→ Modest Proposal: President Trump Should Hire Bill Gates As Global Ambassador For Development Programs

→ Opinion: The Trump DOJ Is Probably Right About Jeffrey Epstein

In one of the more inexplicable events we can recall witnessing in a long time, Rep. Maria Salazar just announced an amnesty bill, which she calls the Dignity Act.

The headline idea of the bill is that it would grant residence and work permits to illegal aliens who have been continuously in the US since before 2021, in other words before the Bidenwave, and it explicitly rules out a path to citizenship for those aliens.

This would already cause a huge blow to the rule of law and constitutional rule, as well as defeat an important purpose of immigration restriction and enforcement, which is to push up wages for working Americans.

However, as is the usually the case with such bills, it is riddled with loopholes which make it even worse than it looks like. For example, it includes the DREAM Act, so all people who were minors would be legalized, including people who came as teenagers of their own volition. And those DREAMers would have a path to citizenship.

The bill includes a requirement that the alien must have been continuously present, however, that requirement is waived if the alien has been previously removed—in other words, somebody who came illegally, was deported, and then came back illegally again, which sounds like exactly the worst kind of rule-breaking individual who should not be allowed to stay in the US for a minute longer than physically possible. Another outrageous loophole: while the bill officially says that gang members cannot benefit from its amnesty, the bill forbids law enforcement from using federal or state gang databases to determine whether someone is a gang member. But wait! There's worse! How about human traffickers? Surely human traffickers can't get amnesty under this bill? Well, in theory, yes, except that the law gives the Secretary of DHS discretion to waive this provision "for humanitarian purposes, for family unity, or because the waiver is otherwise in the public interest." It doesn't take a particularly Machiavellian mind to understand how a Democratic administration would use a provision like that.

In other words, this bill is very clearly designed, consciously so, to lead to the amnesty of gang members and human traffickers.

If you want to get an idea of how bad this bill is, here, Will Chamberlain, Senior Counsel at the Article III Project, explains how "the wife-beating illegal alien MS-13 gang banging human trafficker Kilmar Abrego Garcia could be granted citizenship by a future Democrat administration, with no further changes to American law."

We honestly cannot understand what explains this. Why would a Republican sponsor such a bill? It currently has nine Republican sponsors. Why would they do so now, six months into an Administration that has made border enforcement a centerpiece of its policy, in a Party which is now totally united on immigration restriction? Why would they do so given that there is very little chance that the Speaker would allow it to come to the floor?

There are mysteries in this life.

Policy News You Need To Know

#Rescission — The rescission bill finally passed the Senate, after the procedural vote yesterday which signaled passage. It passed 51-49, with McConnell deciding to vote for final passage after having voted against advancing the bill. It preserves PEPFAR, but cuts most of foreign aid, as well as funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Since the Senate version is different to the House's, it's going to the House now.

#TheEconomy — More strong economic data has come out: US June retail sales rose 0.6% month over month, versus estimates of 0.1%; US jobless claims came in at 221,000 versus estimates of 233,000; and the July Philadelphia Fed Employment Index came in at 10.3 versus an estimate of -9.8. (Via Bloomberg's Joe Weisenthal)

#HigherEd — At NR, Benjamin Rothove has a good article showing that conservative scholars can't agree on the right way to increase ideological diversity at American universities. Everybody agrees on the diagnosis, but nobody can agree on the cure.

SEE ALSO: How The Trump Administration Can Take Over The Ivy League

#HigherEd — Speaking of, Cato's Andrew Gillen has published his annual report on state funding of public colleges. Several headline findings… First, the idea of public disinvestment in state colleges is "a myth"; state funding of public colleges goes up and down with the business cycle, but the long-term trend is always upward. Second, there is no observable statistical relationship between changes in state funding and changes in tuition; in other words, the idea that state colleges increase tuition to make up for cuts in state funding is not true. And third, and this was most surprising to us, total revenue for public colleges has reached an all-time high.

#America — Excellent initiative! Heritage is launching an "America's 250th Innovation Prize" in order "to support and encourage national, state, and local non-profits to develop new, creative projects that will educate our citizens, rekindle in them a love of country, and have a lasting cultural impact on the rising generation." Apply by September 2.

#Reg #Telecoms — FCC Chairman Brendan Carr has announced that the FCC has cut its application backlog in half. This is good, effective, efficient governance. More please.

SEE ALSO: Brendan Carr's "Build America" Agenda And The Future of MAGA Governance

#Chyna #Manufacturing #NationalSecurity — We confess to finding this a bit of a puzzle: "Reversing Previous Restrictions, Washington Allows NVIDIA To Sell Advanced Chips to China." The Foundation for Defense of Democracies has a policy brief on this, by analyst Jack Burnham.

#GreenNewScam — According to an unpublished memo unearthed by Josh Siegel and Zack Colman of Politico Pro, the Department of the Interior is planning on blocking permits for new wind and solar projects. The lack of transparency and formal process is saddening, but this is in the service of a good policy outcome.

#PublicOrder — Excellent news: Houston has passed a law making it illegal to sit or lie down on a sidewalk. It turns out that vagrancy laws were good. They were good for society as a whole, but they were also good for the homeless, as the kind of people who end up in that type of situation need sticks, as well as carrots, to be able to get their lives back together. Let's hope this sparks a nationwide trend.

#PublicOrder — Speaking of, Chris Rufo at City Journal explains how the Trump Administration can shut down open-air drug markets.