- Trump directed the Commerce Department to create plan for a foreign-made film tariff.
- Many countries offer lucrative incentives to attract film and television production.
- About half of big-budget U.S. projects are filmed or produced outside the U.S.
In a Sunday posting to Truth Social, President Donald Trump suggested subsidies paid by other countries to lure film and TV production projects represent a national security threat and directed the U.S. Commerce Department to pursue a new, 100% tariff on foreign-made films.
“The Movie Industry in America is DYING a very fast death,” Trump wrote. “Other Countries are offering all sorts of incentives to draw our filmmakers and studios away from the United States. Hollywood, and many other areas within the U.S.A., are being devastated. This is a concerted effort by other Nations and, therefore, a National Security threat. It is, in addition to everything else, messaging and propaganda! Therefore, 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. WE WANT MOVIES MADE IN AMERICA, AGAIN!”
It’s not clear how a tariff targeting film and TV content produced in other countries would work, whether or not it would apply to streaming content and how it would address a common aspect of big-budget productions which often include content created from a mix of domestic and international locations.
Governments around the world and individual U.S. states have had incentive and tax break programs in place for years seeking to leverage the economic boost of visiting film and television production crews. In 2023, about half the spending on U.S.-produced movie and TV projects with budgets in excess of $40 million went outside the U.S., according to data from ProdPro.
“I think the most likely consequence is not that more productions will be done outside of America, or more productions would be done in America, but probably that just fewer productions will (be made),” Scott Roxborough, Europe bureau chief of the Hollywood Reporter, told CNBC.
Where movies are made
The Utah Film Commission offers refundable tax credits of up to 25% on in-state spending for film and TV projects and touts the Beehive State as having “many unique locations, studio space, and thousands of professional local talent, crew and vendors.”
Last month, the Utah Board of Tourism Development officials approved a little more than $5.4 million in various incentives toward five new productions scattered across Summit, Salt Lake and Utah counties this year. Projects receiving incentive awards included a new movie starring Steve Carell and the sixth season of “The Chosen”.
U.S. film and television production has been hampered in recent years, with setbacks from the COVID-19 pandemic, the Hollywood guild strikes of 2023 and the recent wildfires in the Los Angeles area, per the Associated Press. Overall production in the U.S. was down 26% last year compared with 2021, according to data from ProdPro, which tracks production. Ampere Analysis predicts some $248 billion will be spent globally in 2025 to produce film and television content.
According to a survey of film and television production company executives, Toronto, the U.K., Vancouver, Central Europe and Australia are the top locations for shooting content, with California placing sixth, Georgia seventh, New Jersey eighth and New York ninth, per AP.
“Other nations have been stealing the movie-making capabilities from the United States,” Trump told reporters at the White House on Sunday night after returning from a weekend in Florida. “If they’re not willing to make a movie inside the United States we should have a tariff on movies that come in.”
The tariff tumult
Foreign-made films are the president’s latest target for taxation.
Trump announced a raft of country-specific reciprocal tariffs last month along with a blanket 10% levy on foreign imports. On April 9, the president declared a 90-day pause on the reciprocal trade fees but kept the 10% assessment in place. That same day, Trump also announced an increase on imports from China that raised the effective levy on most imports from the country to 145%.
Here’s where new U.S. tariffs stand for the moment:
- China tariffs are at 145%, following a series of increases.
- Tariffs of 25% are in place on steel and aluminum imports, imported automobiles and goods from Canada and Mexico not covered by the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement.
- Imports from all other countries are subject to a 10% trade levy.