The Trump administration is reworking deals made with semiconductor makers under the Biden-era CHIPS Act to secure better terms that would bring more investment to the United States, according to Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick.
At a Senate Appropriations Committee hearing on Wednesday, Lutnick highlighted a revised deal with TSMC, which received $6.6 billion in direct federal funding under the CHIPS Act in exchange for a commitment to invest $65 billion to build three state-of-the-art factories in Arizona. In March, the Taiwanese company announced it would add $100 billion to its previous pledge, without any extra subsidies from the government.
“We’re getting more value for the same dollars,” Lutnick told Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), who asked whether the Commerce Department was withholding CHIPS dollars that had already been awarded….