Build America, Buy America — enacted in the 2021 infrastructure law — requires that infrastructure projects receiving federal financial assistance use domestically produced iron, steel, manufactured products, and construction materials. For broadband and utility construction, it reaches into every reel of cable, every cabinet, and every pallet of conduit on the job.
What the preference actually covers
Three buckets, three tests. Iron and steel: all manufacturing processes from melting onward must occur in the U.S. Manufactured products: manufactured in the U.S. with a majority of component cost domestic. Construction materials (a defined list including fiber optic cable, optical fiber, and plastics like conduit): all listed manufacturing processes domestic. Which test applies to which item — and items that straddle categories — is exactly where projects stumble, and where OMB's implementing guidance controls.
Waivers: real but never assumed
Agencies may waive BABA where domestic supply is unavailable, costs are unreasonable, or the public interest requires — and agencies have issued targeted, time-limited waivers for specific equipment categories in broadband programs where U.S. manufacturing wasn't ready. The operative words are specific and time-limited: a waiver covers what its text covers, for the period it states, under the program it names. Check the current waiver posture for your program and award date; never inherit last year's assumption.
Compliance as paperwork discipline
In the field, BABA is documentation: manufacturer certification letters for every covered product, retained against the bill of materials, before installation — because ripping out non-compliant cable after the audit is the expensive version. It sits alongside wage determinations and certified payroll in the funded-work compliance chassis; contractors like Nevantin that already collect the letters as material arrives make the grant winner's audit file build itself. Program context: our BEAD guide and the wider funding stack.