President Joe Biden paid his sixth visit this year to Philadelphia on Thursday where he toured the Philly Shipyard as well as announced the first-ever Gulf of Mexico offshore wind lease sale.

Mayor Jim Kenney, Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon (D., Pa.) and other local leaders were in attendance. 

Union workers at the shipyard are building a new offshore wind vessel called the Acadia, which will help build offshore wind farms. Biden was present for the steel-cutting ceremony for the Acadia.

The White House says the offshore wind farm and the Acadia will help create hundreds of new union jobs as well as boost clean energy manufacturing.

“Our investing in America agenda is bringing our clean energy supply chains home,” Biden said in his speech yesterday. “Across the Delaware River in Paulsboro, New Jersey, workers are rolling the steel foundation for another large-scale wind project.”

The administration estimates building Acadia in the South Philly shipyard will generate $125 million in economic activity each year as well as employ 1,000 union workers to build the vessel using steel that was manufactured in Indiana.

It would be a huge boost for the Philly Shipyard whose workforce has suffered in recent years. In 2019, the shipyard was forced to lay off most of its workers as the new vessel pipeline dried up, but it’s flowing again.

The company now employs over 1,500 workers building ships and expects to graduate more than 200 local apprentices.

This was Biden’s at least 13th Philly visit since first taking office in January 2021. First lady Jill Biden, who grew up in Montgomery County, will prove to be consequential to her husband’s reelection campaign in 2024. 

Following his tour, Biden delivered a speech about “Bidenomics” and his administration’s obligation to create clean energy. At a union rally in the city ast month Biden told the crowd: 

“Bidenomics...I don’t know what the hell that is. But it’s working.”

The First Lady was most recently touting ‘Bidenomics’ in Pittsburgh Tuesday and Atlantic City last week. The White House says 'Bidenomics' are pushing a nationwide manufacturing boom that is creating jobs and onshoring clean energy supply chains.

The President revealed the Bidenomics messaging with a speech in South Carolina last month. 

”Bidenomics is just another way of saying “restoring the American Dream,” he said. ”…It’s rooted in what always worked best for this country: investing in America. Because when you invest in our people, when you strengthen the middle class, we see stronger economic growth that benefits everybody.”

The White House defines Bidenomics as such: 

– Making smart public investments in America

– Empowering and educating workers to grow the middle class

– Promoting competition to lower costs and help entrepreneurs and small businesses thrive. 

However, Biden’s economic agenda has attracted much criticism from Republicans who’ve denounced his pandemic-recovery efforts with going too far as well as helping inflation rise to as high as it did a year ago and rising interest rates that have since gradually decreased.

“For the longest time, we’ve been told to give up on manufacturing in America. How many times have you heard or read in the paper the last 25 years we can never lead the world in manufacturing again? Well, we are and we will. We’ll never believe that. I’ve never believed it, and I don’t think most of you did,” Biden said. 

“This nation used to lead the world in manufacturing. And we’re going to do it again.”