(1) Section 8 of article I of the United States 
Constitution provides Congress with authority over 
international trade. Congress has used that author-
ity to approve a number of trade agreements, includ-
ing the WTO Agreement. 
(2) Section 8 of article I of the United States 
Constitution provides Congress with authority to 
provide intellectual property protections in order to 
‘‘promote the progress of science and useful arts’’. 
People in the United States rely on those protections 
to support jobs and continue the highly successful 
leadership of the United States with respect to inno-
vation. 
(3) The United States may not withdraw or 
otherwise alter the rights and obligations for the 
United States arising from a congressionally ap-
proved trade agreement without the consent of Con-
gress. 
(4) The United States is a global leader in con-
taining and ending the COVID–19 pandemic. 
(5) Innovators in the United States successfully 
and rapidly brought to fruition vaccines that provide 
highly effective protection against COVID–19. At fa-
cilities across the United States, thousands of 
United States workers are working around the clock 
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to manufacture COVID–19 vaccines, contributing to 
the rapid, global scale up of manufacturing that is 
expected to reach at least 10,000,000,000 doses by 
the end of 2021. 
(6) The United States is a founding member of 
the World Trade Organization. The United States 
has secured and supported critical commitments in 
the WTO for protection of intellectual property of 
United States persons and globally, including under 
the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property 
Rights Agreement or the TRIPS Agreement. 
(7) In implementing the Uruguay Round, Con-
gress established under section 315 of the Uruguay 
Round Agreements Act (19 U.S.C. 3581) that it is 
the objective of the United States to ‘‘accelerate the 
implementation’’ of the TRIPS Agreement and to 
‘‘seek enactment and effective implementation by 
foreign countries of laws to protect and enforce in-
tellectual property rights that supplement and 
strengthen the standards’’ of the TRIPS Agreement. 
(8) Longstanding intellectual property protec-
tions are critical to efforts by the United States and 
the biopharmaceutical industry to develop and man-
ufacture vaccines for both people in the United 
States and around the world. 
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(9) The United States is committed to pro-
viding global access to COVID–19 vaccines. 
(10) In order to accelerate production and dis-
tribution of COVID–19 vaccines, biopharmaceutical 
manufacturers in the United States are collaborating 
at a scale that previously was unimaginable, includ-
ing by entering into hundreds of voluntary manufac-
turing, production, and other partnerships around 
the world. 
(11) Manufacturing each of the COVID–19 
vaccines involves highly specialized and unique infra-
structure and equipment, as well as highly trained 
and experienced personnel. Manufacturing and dis-
tributing safe and effective COVID–19 vaccines on 
a global scale is incredibly challenging. Many experts 
on vaccine production and distribution are warning 
that waiving intellectual property protections will un-
dermine the global response to the COVID–19 pan-
demic and compromise vaccine safety, including by 
disrupting the distribution of scarce raw materials 
for vaccines that existing vaccine makers with prov-
en track records for delivering high-quality, safe, 
and effective vaccines need to continue their own 
production. 
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(12) The United States Trade Representative 
announced without any consultation with Congress 
that the United States will support a waiver of intel-
lectual property protections under the TRIPS Agree-
ment for COVID–19 vaccines. That decision is not 
consistent with the intellectual property negotiating 
objectives of the United States set forth in section 
315 of the Uruguay Round Agreements Act (19 
U.S.C. 3581). 
(13) That waiver announcement created confu-
sion, and raised concerns that a successful effort to 
suspend protections will weaken already strained 
supply chains and foster the proliferation of ineffec-
tive and potentially dangerous vaccines. 
(14) The Trade Representative has not ex-
plained how a waiver of the TRIPS Agreement will 
expand vaccine production and access, particularly 
considering that the major impediments to vaccina-
tion efforts include the following: 
(A) The difficulty in meeting the technical 
specifications of production and appropriately 
ensuring that finished vaccines are high-quality, 
safe, and effective. 
(B) The scarcity of raw materials for the 
vaccines. 
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(C) Last-mile distribution and cold-chain 
storage. 
(D) Trade barriers to the free flow of in-
puts and finished products. 
(15) The Government of the People’s Republic 
of China and the Government of the Russian Fed-
eration are engaged in large scale industrial espio-
nage and technology theft of intellectual property of 
United States persons. The Department of Justice 
has issued indictments in connection with attempts 
sponsored by the Government of the People’s Repub-
lic of China to steal United States vaccine research 
with respect to COVID–19. 
(16) The Government of the People’s Republic 
of China and the Government of the Russian Fed-
eration are using their vaccines as part of diplomatic 
efforts that may be contrary to the national security 
interests of the United States. Vaccines for COVID– 
19 manufactured by persons in the People’s Repub-
lic of China and the Russian Federation appear to 
be less efficacious than those manufactured by pro-
ducers in the United States. The Academy of Mili-
tary Science, the scientific arm of the military of the 
People’s Republic of China, is sponsoring the prin-
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cipal effort by the People’s Republic of China to de-
velop its own mRNA vaccine. 
(17) At a hearing before the Committee on Fi-
nance of the Senate on May 12, 2021, the Trade 
Representative would not commit either— 
(A) to ensure that any waiver of the 
TRIPS Agreement would exclude the People’s 
Republic of China and the Russian Federation; 
or 
(B) to ensure that Congress has advance 
access to the negotiating proposals of the 
United States for any such waiver. 
(18) The innovative biopharmaceutical compa-
nies in the United States contribute more than 
$1,100,000,000,000 annually to the United States 
economy, and employ more than 500,000 workers 
making 1.4 times the average earnings in the United 
States, including 153,000 workers who do not have 
a college degree. 
(19) Waiving intellectual property protections, 
particularly of the mRNA technology platform in 
which the Defense Advanced Research Project Agen-
cy invested not less than $250,000,000, raises seri-
ous economic and national security concerns. 
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SEC. 3. SENSE OF CONGRESS. 
It is the sense of Congress that— 
(1) the United States should continue to act as 
a global leader to help contain and end the COVID– 
19 pandemic at home and abroad; 
(2) innovators in the United States are already 
heroes for their breakthrough work in developing 
and producing COVID–19 vaccines; 
(3) it should be a priority of the global commu-
nity, with the assistance of the United States, to ef-
ficiently and quickly manufacture and distribute 
COVID–19 vaccines around the world, and in par-
ticular to those countries that are most vulnerable; 
(4) current impediments to further vaccination 
efforts are due to— 
(A) the technically difficult manufacturing 
requirements for vaccines; 
(B) the need to appropriately ensure that 
vaccines are high-quality, safe, and effective; 
(C) raw material constraints; and 
(D) difficulties in distribution; 
(5) 
intellectual 
property 
protections 
for 
COVID–19 vaccines have not impeded vaccination 
efforts for COVID–19; 
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(6) intellectual property protections in fact help 
ensure the safe and efficient manufacturing of 
COVID–19 vaccines; 
(7) waiving intellectual property protections 
could lead to the production of substandard, ineffec-
tive, and potentially unsafe COVID–19 vaccines; 
(8) the Trade Representative must consult with 
Congress before taking a position on the current 
TRIPS Agreement waiver proposal before the WTO 
and any further proposals to waive or weaken intel-
lectual property obligations under the TRIPS Agree-
ment; 
(9) Congress and the people of the United 
States are entitled to comprehensive expert analysis 
regarding the implications of a waiver to the TRIPS 
Agreement for jobs, economic growth, public health, 
and national security in the United States; and 
(10) the United States must oppose any waiver 
to intellectual property obligations under the TRIPS 
Agreement for the response to the COVID–19 pan-
demic until those implications are fully analyzed. 
SEC. 4. DEFINITIONS. 
In this Act: 
(1) APPROPRIATE
CONGRESSIONAL
COMMIT-
TEES.—The term ‘‘appropriate congressional com-
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mittees’’ means the Committee on Finance of the 
Senate and the Committee on Ways and Means of 
the House of Representatives. 
(2) COMMISSION.—The term ‘‘Commission’’ 
means the United States International Trade Com-
mission. 
(3) MINISTERIAL
CHANGE.—The term ‘‘min-
isterial change’’, with respect to a trade agreement, 
means a change to address a clerical, typographical, 
or grammatical error and does not include any 
change that would change the intended rights or ob-
ligations of a party to the trade agreement. 
(4) OFFICIAL ADVISOR.—The term ‘‘official ad-
visor’’ means a person accredited by the Trade Rep-
resentative on behalf of the President as an official 
adviser to the United States delegations to inter-
national conferences, meetings, and negotiating ses-
sions relating to international trade negotiations, 
and who may attend any portion of those negotia-
tions. 
(5) 
COVID–19 
PANDEMIC.—The 
term 
‘‘COVID–19 pandemic’’ means the outbreak of novel 
coronavirus (COVID–19) that was declared by the 
World Health Organization on March 11, 2020, to 
be a pandemic. 
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(6) STATE SPONSOR OF TERRORISM.—The term 
‘‘state sponsor of terrorism’’ means a country the 
government of which the Secretary of State has de-
termined is a government that has repeatedly pro-
vided support for acts of international terrorism, for 
purposes of— 
(A) section 1754(c)(1)(A)(i) of the Export 
Control Reform Act of 2018 (50 U.S.C. 
4813(c)(1)(A)(i)); 
(B) section 620A of the Foreign Assistance 
Act of 1961 (22 U.S.C. 2371); 
(C) section 40(d) of the Arms Export Con-
trol Act (22 U.S.C. 2780(d)); or 
(D) any other provision of law. 
(7) TRADE
AGREEMENT.—The term ‘‘trade 
agreement’’ means any trade agreement to which the 
United States is a party that has been approved by 
Congress, including the TRIPS Agreement. 
(8) 
TRADE
REPRESENTATIVE.—The 
term 
‘‘Trade Representative’’ means the United States 
Trade Representative. 
(9) TRIPS AGREEMENT.—The term ‘‘TRIPS 
Agreement’’ means the Agreement on Trade-Related 
Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights referred to in 
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section 101(d)(15) of the Uruguay Round Agree-
ments Act (19 U.S.C. 3511(d)(15)). 
(10) TRIPS WAIVER.—The term ‘‘TRIPS waiv-
er’’ means any waiver of an obligation imposed on 
members of the World Trade Organization under the 
TRIPS Agreement. 
(11) WORLD TRADE ORGANIZATION; WTO; WTO 
AGREEMENT.—The terms ‘‘World Trade Organiza-
tion’’, ‘‘WTO’’, and ‘‘WTO Agreement’’ have the 
meanings given those terms in section 2 of the Uru-
guay Round Agreements Act (19 U.S.C. 3501). 
SEC. 5. PROHIBITION ON COMPROMISING UNITED STATES 
TRADING RIGHTS TO CHINA AND RUSSIA. 
(a) PROHIBITION ON WITHDRAWAL, SUSPENSION, OR 
MODIFICATION.— 
(1) IN GENERAL.—The President, and any offi-
cial, employee, or agent of the United States, may 
not negotiate or conclude any withdrawal, suspen-
sion, or modification to a trade agreement that ad-
versely affects, nullifies, or impairs the rights of the 
United States or United States persons under a 
trade agreement with respect to the People’s Repub-
lic of China or the Russian Federation. 
(2) DISCIPLINE.—Any official, employee, or 
agent of the United States who violates subsection 
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