Trump threatens ‘100% Tariff’ on all foreign and Hollywood movies filmed outside the US: ‘Candy from a baby’

Donald Trump on Monday reiterated his plans to levy tariffs as high as 100% on movies filmed outside of the United States, whether they are produced by Hollywood or foreign-owned film companies.

The president wrote on Truth Social that the fault of America’s supposedly “stolen” movie business lay with California’s Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, whom he frequently targets for scorn but did not mention by name in the post.

Trump added that the would be imposing a 100% tariff to stop what he called a “never ending problem”, though it was not stated when those tariffs would be put into place.

“Our movie making business has been stolen from the United States of America, by other Countries, just like stealing “candy from a baby.” California, with its weak and incompetent Governor, has been particularly hard hit! Therefore, in order to solve this long time, never ending problem, I will be imposing a 100% Tariff on any and all movies that are made outside of the United States,” he wrote.

The president originally made a threat to tariff the film industry in May of this year. The vice chairman of United Talent Agency, one of the largest firms in Hollywood, told CNN at the time that Trump’s move would virtually halt movie production worldwide: it “has the ability to bring the movie business to a standstill – which is the last thing Hollywood needs after dual strikes and a content recession.”

In a second post, the president made another sweeping trade threat: a vow to impose tariffs “on any country that does not make its furniture in the United States” — which, translated into reality, could mean new reciprocal tariffs affecting furniture imports. Just as in the first case, he did not specify when these tariffs would supposedly be implemented.

A Democratic congresswoman representing Hollywood and some of the surrounding communities, Laura Friedman, released a statement calling Trump’s action the wrong response to a real problem facing the movie and TV industries.

“I’m relieved President Trump recognizes that we are losing a signature American product: the domestic film & TV industry. However, his 100% tariff on foreign films will raise costs for consumers. As the representative of nearly every major producer in Hollywood and a former film producer, I know what will work, without harming consumers: a national film tax credit,” said Friedman.

“It’s working in California and it will work across the country. I hope the President will join us in pioneering a real solution that levels the playing field with international competition. I’ll keep meeting with lawmakers, labor unions, and industry leaders to make a national film tax credit a reality. Thousands of US jobs, and the LA economy, depend on it,” added Friedman.

Trump’s Truth Socialing took a strange turn over the weekend after he seemingly fell for an AI deepfake of his own voice being used to hoodwink gullible social media users into falling for the “medbed” conspiracy theory and the associated scams that follow such misinformation campaigns. On Saturday evening, Trump posted a fake Fox News segment promoting the conspiracy theory, only to delete the post Sunday morning. The White House didn’t respond to a request for comment about the deleted post, and never issued a clarification to the president’s followers.

Now, on Monday, the president has returned to using the platform to announce matters of policy — and, in typical Trump fashion, doing so in a way that most experts agree would be completely unworkable.

Film producers and other industry veterans, both American and from countries around the world, derided the president’s plans as toxic to the industry itself when they were first announced.

“He will kill the U.S. industry quicker as this will increase the cost of U.S. films that already weren’t selling well internationally. Creating an incentive for shooting in the U.S. would have been smarter but I’m not sure he has that much intelligence,” one expert told Deadline in May.

Similar to concerns many lawmakers had with TikTok, Trump declared in May that the status of the American film industry was actually a national security threat and claimed that foreign countries’ movies amounted to “propaganda” — a criticism that has been leveled at American media by the rest of the world for decades.

At the time, the president said his plans for 100% tariffs were to being “immediately”. Nearly five months later, the president is announcing them again, as if for the first time.

“This is a concerted effort by other Nations and, therefore, a National Security threat. It is, in addition to everything else, messaging and propaganda!” Trump wrote in May. He added: “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.”