Review - HR 774 Introduced – MEANS Act

Last month, Rep Dingell (D,MI) introduced HR 774, the Manufacturing Economy and National Security (MEANS) Act. The bill would require the Department of Commerce to “develop and implement a strategy taking a whole-of-Government approach to support the resilience, diversity, security, and strength of supply chains.” The bill would authorize $35-billion for the programs outlined in the Act and $5-million for the DOC Inspector General audit of the program. The bill includes minor cybersecurity mentions.

Moving Forward

Dingell and two of her three cosponsors {Rep Blunt (D,DE) and Rep Kelly (D,IL)} are members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee to which this bill is assigned for consideration. Typically, this means that there should be sufficient influence to see the bill considered in Committee. In the 118^th, Congress, with the Republican focus on reducing spending, this bill will probably face significant opposition from Republican members of the Committee due to the cost associated with the programs outlined in the bill. It will be interesting to see if this bill makes it to Committee consideration.

Commentary

Cybersecurity is a very minor component of the supply chain security program outlined in this bill. Even so, I would have liked to have seen more mention of cybersecurity, particularly control system security, in the bill. For example, I would have written the definition of ‘industrial equipment’ in §4(w)(10) differently:

“(10) INDUSTRIAL EQUIPMENT.—The term “industrial equipment” means any component, subsystem, system, information system (as defined in 6 USC 1501), equipment, tooling, accessory, part, or assembly necessary for the manufacturing of a critical good.”

For more details about the provisions of the bill, including the specific cybersecurity provisions, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/hr-774-introduced - subscription required.