News & Insights

Two manufacturing leaders testified at House Ways and Means Committee field hearings in Nevada and California this past weekend.

• Click Bond Director of Manufacturing Austin Robinson testified on Friday in Las Vegas, focusing on the impacts of the One Big Beautiful Bill’s tax provisions for the manufacturing workforce.
• On Saturday, Robinson Helicopter Company Vice President of Business Development Will Fulton testified alongside NAM President and CEO Jay Timmons at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, where they discussed the impacts of the tax provisions for manufacturers. (In case you missed it, here is our article from yesterday on Timmons’ testimony.).

Click Bond: Austin has spent his career in manufacturing. He now manages the 80% of employees who make up the manufacturing workforce at Click Bond, which designs, manufactures and supports adhesive bonded fasteners that are used in space, aviation, marine and other applications, both civil and defense.

• After Austin thanked policymakers for passing the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, he explained what it means for his company. “2017 tax reform was tremendously impactful for both our business and our workers,” he said. “It allowed us to increase wages, scale up our engineering and development workforce, invest in next-generation equipment and create a new employee academic assistance program.”
• “[By] making permanent a pro-growth tax code, the One Big Beautiful Bill will empower us to continue and expand these investments, to purchase more equipment and conduct more research and to further increase pay and benefits for our employees.”

Investing in workers: Austin emphasized that the bill will allow manufacturers to keep investing in workers, building on the pay increases Click Bond was able to provide to their hourly employees following the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.

• “My first employer paid for my education, and I am proud to say that Click Bond does the same for any employees who want to go back to school and develop their skill,” he said. “Our workforce at Click Bond is the most precious resource, and that is reflected in the investments that we make in them. Those investments are actually enabled by a pro-growth tax policy.”

Robinson Helicopter: Will also thanked policymakers for this legislation.

• Robinson “specializes in helicopter design, assembly, inspection, flight testing, manufacturing and production. … Our Torrance, California, manufacturing facility is the world’s leading commercial helicopter manufacturer, period,” he told policymakers.
• “The One Big Beautiful Bill Act supports [Robinson] by driving our ability to accelerate domestic investment expansion and growth. … This legislation helps accelerate our ambitions into a more near-term reality.”

R&D support: “These tax provisions help us to invest both in the design of new technology and its production processes,” Will added. “We recently launched our newest helicopter, the R88, which offers more robust first responder capabilities.”

• “Our R&D efforts for the R88 include the ability to fit that helicopter with more advanced technology and equipment for firefighting, disaster response and emergency medical services. That helicopter will act as an operational control center to a fleet of fire surveillance drones to better scan for any signs of ignition, ensure faster response times and expand the capacity of fire departments to contain fires earlier.”
• “Thanks to your leadership, Congress and the administration have empowered Robinson Helicopter to create jobs, invest in equipment, innovate through R&D and drive economic growth faster,” he concluded.