Trump Given Credit By Intel For $7bn US Factory Started Under Obama

Intel CEO’s statement that Arizona plant is because of Trump’s policies skews truth…

Intel’s CEO, Brian Krzanich, used a meeting with President Donald Trump to announce it would invest approximately $7bn building a factory in Arizona and create 3,000 jobs.

The densely packed Oval Office meeting, filled with members of the press listened intently as Krzanich, standing stood next to Trump and declared that the investment was a direct response to Trump’s business-friendly policies.

An alternative fact?

This turned out to be not completely true though, as the press and social media were quick to point out in the hours after the event. But even with the critical storm that followed, there were some elements of truth to the story, just not that many.

Work on the Intel factory, called Fab 42, actually began in 2011. Intel CEO of the time, Paul Otellini, even gave President Obama a tour in 2012. President Obama even made a speech where he said Intel’s new factory was an “example of an America that attracts the next generation of good manufacturing jobs.”

Building work at Fab 42 stopped in 2014 however, with rumors circulating that the continued slow growth of PC sales, and the company’s failure to launch in the mobile arena, made Fab 42 an expensive luxury surplus to requirements.

Obama at the Fab 42 factory in 2012…

Now however, Intel has resumed building work, as it needs the space to help manufacture and deliver the next generation of ARM processors.

“From a tax and regulatory position we have been disadvantaged relative to the rest of the world where we compete,” Krzanich wrote in an email to Intel employees in the same week he met Trump.

Suddenly it became clear just why Krzanich was so happy to give credit to the president of the US for something that ultimately, he had nothing to do with. Intel, it seems, is hoping that by giving Trump an easy ‘jobs’ win, they will in return receive more tax cuts, looser regulations, and probably more federal aid in the form of subsidies.

Krzanich continued in his email: “That’s why we support the administration’s policies to level the global playing field and make US manufacturing competitive worldwide through new regulatory standards and investment policies.”  This was even though work on Fab 42 had, likely, been scheduled to get under way again before Trump had even won the election.