By Joseph Lord
President Donald Trump announced on Wednesday that tariffs on semiconductors and computer microchips will be as high as 100 percent—but indicated companies could win an exemption by committing to building facilities and manufacturing in the United States.
“We’ll be putting a tariff of approximately 100 percent on chips and semiconductors,” Trump told reporters. “But if you’re building in the United States of America, there’s no charge, even though you’re building and you’re not producing yet.”
It’s unclear when the tariffs will go into effect, though Trump indicated that an announcement on the issue was imminent during an Aug. 5 interview with CNBC’s “Squawk Box.”
In that lengthy interview, Trump said increasing U.S. manufacturing of microchips was the next major push his administration would undertake.
Increasing U.S. independence over manufacturing of the chips and semiconductors that power the modern world—a field currently dominated by foreign nations and China, which controls much of the world’s supply of rare earth metals—is a bipartisan goal.
During President Joe Biden’s tenure in office, Congress passed the CHIPS and Science Act, which encouraged production of these components in the United States.
Trump’s threat to increase tariffs to 100 percent on these components could raise a near-existential threat to tech companies that don’t manufacture in the United States, and aligns with Trump’s larger goal of decreasing U.S. reliance on foreign industry and materials.
This is a breaking story and will be updated.
