Statement by Director Squires before the United States Senate Subcommittee on Intellectual Property Committee on the Judiciary

Statement as prepared

John A. Squires

Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office

before the U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary,
Subcommittee on Intellectual Property

Washington, D.C.

September 29, 2026

Chairman Tillis, Ranking Member Schiff, Chairman Grassley, Ranking Member Durbin, and Members of the Subcommittee:

Thank you for today's opportunity to discuss America's Innovation Agency, the USPTO.

Let me begin by again thanking President Trump for his confidence in me, his steadfast commitment to intellectual property, and his clarion call to usher in a Golden Age of American Innovation.

I also am tremendously thankful to Secretary Lutnick for transforming the Department of Commerce, his boundless energy, and his unparalleled vision, understanding intellectual property uniquely, himself an inventor on over 500 patents.

And, finally, thank you to our amazing and so-talented USPTO team-almost 14,000 strong-for their dedication, commitment, and service. I say always that "they are the best in the world at what they do" because, quite simply, they are-and they prove it every day.

Inscribed atop the Department of Commerce's Herbert Hoover building is President Lincoln's famous quote (the only U.S. President who is a patent holder, mind you) that, "The Patent System Adds the Fuel of Interest to the Fire of Genius."

He refers to of course the exclusivity incentive our Founders inscribed-a first in the history of nations-as the only individual right in the Seven Articles of the Constitution Proper. Then and there, American Exceptionalism was born strong.

As President Lincoln explained:

"Before then, any man might instantly use what another had invented; so that the inventor had no special advantage from his own invention.
The patent system changed this."

Indeed it did.

This year, we celebrated America's 250th birthday, starting with America's first patent, signed in 1790 by President George Washington.

Around this time next summer, I'll be proudly presenting Patent No. 13 million and Trademark Registration No. 9 million to President Trump for his signature.

Each celebration was a fresh reminder that strong IP protection affords greatness.

We celebrated Alexander Graham Bell's telephone patent and what the world's sturdiest protection made of his genius.

In Chapel Hill, at the G-20, we celebrated even British subject Henry Bessemer's success-which he found only on America's shores after receiving a U.S. patent.

And not lost on us as we signed the Carolina Principles in person, was that the marvel of human flight, invented by two irrepressible American brothers 123 years earlier in nearby Kitty Hawk, literally brought our nations together.

President Trump is calling for a Golden Age of Innovation. America's Innovation Agency is answering that call. And we're answering with the urgency of now.

Atop the broad shoulders of our genius giants, we've re-dedicated ourselves to American Exceptionalism so that American ingenuity can stand tall again.

Today, I am proud to tell you that we have turned the corner.

Inheriting an unheard-of backlog crisis, now, for the first time in 10 years, output exceeds intake, and we've achieved a 3-year low on backlog. Quality's improved and assets are getting to market faster: each week sooner potentially increasing correlated sales by approximately $50,000.

We are avid SI adopters, generating hundreds-of-thousands of application summaries with LLM tools and, with SI agents, slicing through months of red tape in seconds, with nearly half-a-million cases analyzed in under 6 months.

As to SI, I've reminded the world that our doors are wide open, just as they were 186 years ago to Samuel Morse's code.

We've LOOPed-in back-end challenges to improve front-end quality and restored PTAB to its rightful place as a fair and efficient litigation alternative.

I've banned foreign state-actors' attacks on American patents, created American manufacturing incentives, and given hungry American small businesses a leg-up in global standard setting.

With new local engagement offices, our nationwide footprint is more nimble and includes a ground-breaking partnership with HBCUs.

Finally, we are 100% user-fee based, and have been recognized, yet again, as dependable financial stewards. I sincerely thank Congress for extending our fee-setting authority to December 11th. And I'm looking forward to working together to extend it far into the future.

In closing, while we have much, much, much more to do, we are notching wins, wins, wins. And for IP-intensive industries, that means jobs, jobs, jobs.

Now, we are rapidly scaling to deliver on President Trump's Golden Age, and we are all-in, full-stop, to fire-up America's genius, full-throttle.

Thank you.