Washington (AFP) – US President Donald Trump said Sunday he was ordering new tariffs on all films made outside the United States, claiming Hollywood was being “devastated” by a trend of US filmmakers and studios working abroad. The announcement comes as the White House is coming under mounting criticism over its aggressive trade policies that have seen Trump impose sweeping tariffs on countries around the globe.
“I am authorizing the Department of Commerce, and the United States Trade Representative, to immediately begin the process of instituting a 100% Tariff on any and all Movies coming into our Country that are produced in Foreign Lands,” he wrote on his Truth Social platform. “WE WANT MOVIES MADE IN AMERICA, AGAIN!” Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick reposted Trump’s missive, saying “We’re on it.” No details were provided on how the tariff would be implemented.
Trump’s post comes after China, which has taken the brunt of the US president’s combative trade policies with 145 percent tariffs on many goods, said last month it would reduce the number of US films it imported. “The Movie Industry in America is DYING a very fast death. Other Countries are offering all sorts of incentives to draw our filmmakers and studios away from the United States,” Trump wrote Sunday. “Hollywood, and many other areas within the U.S.A., are being devastated,” he added, claiming that production being drawn to other countries was a “National Security threat.” The implications for the movie industry — or how exactly the tariffs would be enacted — were not immediately clear. There was also no mention in Trump’s post of whether television series, an increasingly popular and profitable sector of production for the screen, would be affected.
Hollywood is a major sector of the United States’ economy, generating more than 2.3 million jobs and $279 billion in sales in 2022, according to the latest data from the Motion Picture Association. But in the wake of the Hollywood strikes and the Covid pandemic impacts — which changed how Americans consumed movies, opting to watch at home instead of in theaters — the industry is still struggling to regain its momentum, industry insiders say. According to a January report by production tracking service ProdPro, the United States is a top filming hub with $14.5 billion in production spend — though that amount is a 26 percent drop compared to two years earlier.
However, a survey of studio executives revealed that their top five preferred production locations for 2025 and 2026 were all outside of the United States, due to competitive tax incentive schemes on offer. First was Toronto, followed by Britain, Vancouver, Central Europe, and then Australia. California came in at sixth place. Ahead of his inauguration in January, Trump appointed longstanding supporters Sylvester Stallone, Mel Gibson, and Jon Voight as special envoys to Hollywood. He said they would make the entertainment industry “STRONGER THAN EVER BEFORE” in a post on Truth Social. Trump and the Republicans have traditionally received scant support from the entertainment industry, and a galaxy of stars from Taylor Swift to George Clooney backed Democrat Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election.
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