State governors from Arizona, New Mexico seek stronger economic ties with Taiwan
Governors from the Southwestern United States are pursuing stronger business ties with Taiwan in hopes of attracting new foreign investments and jobs to their landlocked states
SANTA FE, N.M. — Governors from the Southwestern United States are pursuing stronger business ties with Taiwan in hopes of attracting new foreign investments and jobs to their landlocked states.
Trade missions this week have taken New Mexico. Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham and Arizona counterpart Katie Hobbs, both Democrats, to the self-governing island of Taiwan.
Hobbs said her goal was to encourage ongoing investments to make Arizona a hub for semiconductor manufacturing. She met Monday with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. executives and suppliers, visiting their plant as well as water treatment facilities.
Arizona leaders have been touting that the state will be the home of a Taiwanese microchip manufacturer’s first U.S. plant, generating 12,000 construction jobs.
Construction started in 2021 on that sprawling facility that will utilize precision trademark technology for semiconductor fabrication with the capacity to produce 20,000 wafers per month. Once completed and operational next year, the plant is estimated to create 4,500 high-tech jobs.
Democratic President Joe Biden visited the site in December, praising it as a demonstration of how his policies are fostering job growth. Biden has staked his legacy in large part on major investments in technology and infrastructure that were approved by Congress along bipartisan lines.
At a business conference in Taipei on Tuesday, Lujan Grisham urged entrepreneurs and leaders to consider investment opportunities in her home state, touting a workforce with access to subsidized child care and
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