McCormick called the proposal an “important step forward” for the commonwealth. He argued it could help lay the groundwork for more projects like Amazon’s recently announced $20 billion investment to develop a network of artificial intelligence and cloud computing centers across Pennsylvania.

“We have abundant natural resources. We have an incredible workforce, a skilled workforce that can build these AI data centers. We have incredible technology,” McCormick said, as well as universities and other research institutions working on new innovations.

And McCormick sees other opportunities for investments in Pennsylvania, pointing to the $14 billion deal between U.S. Steel and Japan-based Nippon Steel. Details on the terms of the agreement are still scarce, but the government will seemingly have a say in key decisions about the future of U.S. Steel under Nippon, thanks to a “golden share” arrangement that the federal government made as a condition for supporting the deal.

The golden share, McCormick said, is “critical for our national security and it’s critical for economic security.”

McCormick, who previously served as a deputy national security advisor in the George W. Bush administration and an executive for a global hedge fund firm, pushed back against criticism that the government’s aggressive involvement in a private company’s affairs contradicts Republican ideals of limited government.

“We want to encourage foreign direct investment in Pennsylvania, in the United States,” he said. But he added that “in some industries, there’s sensitivities because of the national security implications. And steel is one of them.”

“So in those particular cases, the government can play a role in negotiating specific agreements that protect our national security interests. That’s what’s happened here,” McCormick said. “We shouldn’t do this for every investment or every acquisition, but we should do it in cases where the national security is at risk, and I think the president did a great thing here for Pennsylvania.”

McCormick’s visit came on the heels of his recently announced energy and innovation summit, which will bring leaders in government, energy, labor and AI technologies together in Pittsburgh next month. President Donald Trump is slated to attend.

In an exchange with reporters, McCormick praised the administration’s ongoing efforts to detain people without legal status – and Trump’s controversial decision to deploy the National Guard in Los Angeles in response to protests of that policy.

The federal agents conducting the immigration raids “are doing a great mission, and I think they’re doing that with professionalism and empathy,” he said. “And I think the people that are protesting, breaking the law, standing on cars, burning the American flag – destroying property is un-American. And I think the president … and those that are deploying the law enforcement and the National Guard are right to stop that violence, stop that damaging of property.”

McCormick also condemned recent political violence, including a recent shooting in which a Minnesota state lawmaker and her husband were shot and killed. Another lawmaker and his wife were wounded. The attack came just months after a man broke into the Pennsylvania governor’s mansion on Passover and started a fire that caused significant damage, sparking concerns that Gov. Josh Shapiro may have been targeted because of his Jewish faith.

“We have to stop the dehumanizing rhetoric that leads to this,” McCormick said. “We have to discourage violence against our public officials.”