The summit is one piece of Build Freedom, a national campaign to close the skilled trades gap in America. A partnership between the Department of War (DoW), the mikeroweWORKS Foundation and the National Labor Exchange, Build Freedom launched in July 2026 with a mission to “build the workforce that builds and defends America.” It is facilitated by DoW’s Industrial Base Analysis and Sustainment (IBAS) program, which also supports IACMI’s ACE, METAL and ACE METAL Foundations programs.
“The Build Freedom Summit demonstrated the power of bringing industry, government and workforce leaders together around a shared mission to strengthen U.S. manufacturing,” said Andrew Pokelwaldt, vice president of Workforce. “IACMI was proud to bring a national perspective to the summit. The relationships built here, the knowledge shared and the actions that follow will help build the skilled workforce and industrial capacity needed for a stronger, more resilient defense industrial base.”
For Sierra Noe, Build Freedom project manager, the summit made those connections clearer.
“It was a great event for connecting and meeting people,” Noe said. “I appreciated hearing directly from Kristopher Rick, IBAS workforce sector lead, about the different phases of Build Freedom at the government’s level, and seeing IACMI’s alignment within IBAS. The event gave me a better understanding of the role IACMI plays in the defense industrial base and Build Freedom’s larger picture.”