Security That Actually Starts With Reality

FoGo PAC is not here to be a permanent opposition research shop. We are here to reward lawmakers who take clean, secure supply chains seriously and who build policy that can survive contact with reality. That is why we support H.R. 3617, the Securing America’s Critical Minerals Supply Act, which the House passed on February 11, 2026, by 223–206 (Roll Call 64).

What H.R. 3617 does

H.R. 3617 updates the Department of Energy’s core responsibilities so DOE must actively focus on securing the supply of “critical energy resources,” defined as resources essential to U.S. energy systems whose supply chain is vulnerable to disruption.

The bill then turns that definition into a standing mandate: DOE must conduct ongoing assessments of criticality, supply chain vulnerability, domestic diversity, capacity constraints, regulatory impacts, import reliance, and strategic exploitation risks.

The part FoGo cares about most

H.R. 3617 explicitly requires DOE to assess how adversarial nations seek to exploit critical energy resource markets to undermine U.S. investment, including through anti-competitive practices, price manipulation, and human rights abuses tied to production and export.

That is not messaging. That is a blueprint for treating supply chain risk like national infrastructure risk.

Who deserves credit

rimary credit goes to Rep. John James (R-MI), the bill’s sponsor.
Secondary credit goes to the original and subsequent cosponsors Reps. Jay Obernolte, Mariannette Miller-Meeks, Neal Dunn, and Erin Houchin, and to the House Energy and Commerce Committee for moving the bill through hearings and markups and reporting it to the House (H. Rept. 119-268).

Why FoGo supports this bill

1) You cannot enforce what you refuse to measure.
Supply chain security fails most often at the first step: governments do not continuously map the chokepoints. H.R. 3617 makes the mapping job permanent. It compels DOE to track single points of failure, capacity bottlenecks (including labor and materials), and the structural vulnerabilities created by import reliance.
This aligns with FoGo’s operating posture: Secure supply chains, yes. Security is not a slogan. It is continuous risk assessment that tells agencies and industry where to diversify, where to build substitutes, and where to invest in reuse and recycling. H.R. 3617 explicitly directs DOE to facilitate strategies to strengthen supply chains, develop substitutes and alternatives, and improve technologies for reuse and recycling.

2) Human rights abuse is not “outside the supply chain.” It is a core vulnerability.
H.R. 3617’s inclusion of human rights abuses as an exploitation vector is more than moral language. It recognizes that abuse can function as a competitive tactic: lowering costs through coercion, suppressing labor rights, or laundering inputs through opaque production networks.

That diagnosis matches the global due diligence consensus. The OECD’s minerals due diligence guidance exists because mineral sourcing can be linked to conflict financing and serious human rights violations, and because responsible supply chains require deliberate risk identification and mitigation.

In practical terms, H.R. 3617 strengthens the policy case for traceability and enforcement coordination, not paperwork theater. And it matters because today’s processing concentration is already extreme: the International Energy Agency reports China is the dominant refiner for 19 of 20 minerals analyzed, with an average market share around 70%, and notes many of these minerals exhibit price volatility worse than oil.

FoGo’s bottom line is simple: A supply chain built on coercion, market manipulation, or opacity is not cheaper. It is brittle. H.R. 3617 is a constructive step toward fixing that brittleness.