Trump’s push to protect US tech supply chain backfires on Tennessee plant

U.S. President Donald Trump's strategy to secure the domestic semiconductor supply chain has inadvertently backfired in Charleston, Tennessee, threatening a major manufacturing plant and endangering local jobs.

The friction stems from White House trade policies aimed at bolstering domestic tech and defense manufacturing.

Under a recent Section 232 proclamation, the administration introduced tariffs and strict price floors on imported polysilicon, the essential raw material used for both solar panels and semiconductor chips.

The tariffs and price floors apply uniformly to downstream products (like wafers and ingots) regardless of whether the polysilicon inside them was sourced in America.

Because American-made polysilicon costs roughly four times more than cheaper Chinese alternatives, domestic buyers are penalized. U.S. producers gain no competitive advantage, while their customers face higher overall costs.

German-owned chemical company Wacker Chemie is weighing the future of its massive Charleston, Tennessee plant—which employs roughly 600 workers.

Following the policy rollout, Wacker reportedly lost its final remaining domestic customers for the material because those buyers opted to source finished components from overseas regions where the price floors and tariffs bite less.

With domestic production already shrinking drastically over the last two decades, losing Wacker’s Tennessee output would leave the U.S. with only a single remaining domestic polysilicon producer—achieving the exact opposite of the administration's goal to thicken and secure the supply chain.

Wacker and industry advocates are pushing the White House to amend the proclamation to explicitly distinguish and reward the use of American-made polysilicon before the rules fully take effect.