Donald Trump’s on-again/off-again affection for Apple goes back several years. Nearly a year before his first term as president began, for example, the then-Republican candidate called for a national boycott against the tech giant, though Trump apparently didn’t mean it; he continued to use Apple products; and his offensive was quickly forgotten.
More recently, the president was pleased when Apple promised to spend more than $500 billion in the United States over the next four years — much of the investment had been planned long before Trump returned to power — though his satisfaction didn’t last long.
Last week during his trip to the Midde East, the president seemed especially concerned about Apple’s international production process. “I had a little problem with Tim Cook yesterday,” Trump said. “I said to him, ‘My friend, I treated you very good. You’re coming here with $500 billion, but now I hear you’re building all over India. I don’t want you building in India.’”
A week later, the president made an unexpected announcement. NBC News reported:
Apple shares dropped as much as 3% Friday after President Donald Trump threatened the tech giant with a 25% tariff if it does not start producing iPhones in the U.S. — his latest salvo directly targeting a U.S. company over how it conducts its business.
“I have long ago informed Tim Cook of Apple that I expect their iPhone’s [sic] that will be sold in the United States of America will be manufactured and built in the United States, not India, or anyplace else,” Trump wrote in a message published to his social media platform. “If that is not the case, a Tariff of at least 25% must be paid by Apple to the U.S. Thank your [sic] for your attention to this matter!”
There are multiple angles to a story like this one, though the NBC News report highlighted one of the most important elements: “Presidents typically avoid giving the appearance of dictating individual companies’ strategies, but Trump has broken with that norm. Instead, he has begun ramping up direct attacks against U.S. companies whose responses to his tariffs he dislikes, including Amazon, Mattel and Walmart.”
This is no small detail. While there are countless examples of presidents pressuring private sector industries, even offering enticements to companies, it’s far from normal for an American leader to declare, in effect, “Follow my commands on your production plans or my government will punish your company.”
But that’s not the only problem. A CNBC report noted, for example, that Apple is likely to blow off Trump’s threat, even if the White House decides to follow through on it.
Analysts said it would probably make more sense for Apple to eat the cost rather than move production stateside. “In terms of profitability, it’s way better for Apple to take the hit of a 25% tariff on iPhones sold in the US market than to move iPhone assembly lines back to US,” wrote Apple supply chain analyst Ming-Chi Kuo on X. Complicating matters further, even if Apple were to agree to shift production to the U.S., Trump would see this as a tremendous win, but American consumers would not: A New York Times report noted that the company would be forced to at least double the price of an iPhone. The Times quoted Wayne Lam, an analyst with TechInsights, a market research firm, who called Trump’s demand “absurd” and “not economically feasible.” As for Apple’s competitors, their optimism about the developments should probably be kept in check: The president announced, hours after publishing his online missive, that he would similarly punish Samsung and any other company that fails to make its phones on American soil. When a reporter specifically asked Trump if he has the legal authority to impose tariffs on a specific company, he dodged the question.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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