To Counter China, Some Republicans Are Abandoning Free-Market Orthodoxy

The semiconductor measure is something no Republican would have supported a decade ago, according to Rob Atkinson, president of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, a think tank that promotes industrial policy. “Not in a million years. They would have been pilloried for picking winners,” he said. President Trump has helped open the door to this conservative shift by repeatedly speaking about the importance of American manufacturing and by raising alarms about the competitive threat China poses, Atkinson said. But for the most part, he said, “these views and sentiments have not really translated into an industrial policy that is supported by any real spending."