On August 22, 2025, President Donald Trump told reporters he thinks the United States should receive a 10% stake in Intel after meeting with CEO Lip Bu Tan, and he said the company gave $10 billion to the US. This matters because it links CHIPS Act money to government ownership of a major chipmaker.
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick recently argued the US should receive an equity stake in Intel in exchange for CHIPS Act funding. That position has been reported alongside the president’s comments. Trump had earlier called for the immediate resignation of Intel CEO Brian Krzanich over alleged ties to China, but the president said their meeting changed his view and opened talks about a government stake in the company.
“I met a man, he was a very nice man, and I called for his removal because I saw something by a man named Tom Cotton, a senator from Arkansas. He’s a great guy, friend of mine, supporter of mine, big supporter. I was a supporter of him too. And he wrote a pretty nasty story about the head of Intel, and I said, ‘Well, that’s right, he should resign,’ and he came and he saw me, and we talked for a while. I liked him a lot, I thought he was very good. I thought he was somewhat a victim, but you know, nobody’s a total victim, I guess. And I said, ‘You know what? I think the United States should be given 10% of Intel.’ And he said, ‘I would consider that.’ I said, ‘Well I would like you to do that,’ because Intel’s been left behind, as you know, compared to Jensen and some of our friends, Nvidia and some of the people, and people in—Intel should have never been—Intel was the biggest, most powerful chip company in the world.”
Trump: "I said, 'You know what? I think the United States should be given 10% of Intel.'"
Trump on Intel boss: "He walked in wanting to keep his job and he ended up giving us $10 billion for the United States. We do a lot of deals like that. I'll do more of them."
Trump then said the company had already given $10 billion to the United States and framed that as part of a pattern of deals the administration makes. Yikes, it’s unusual.
Senator Bernie Sanders responded by saying he was glad the administration agreed with an amendment he offered three years ago and argued taxpayers should get a return when billions in government funding go to profitable corporations. Reuters reported Sanders’s statement, and you can read that report on Reuters.
“I am glad the Trump administration is in agreement with the amendment I offered three years ago,” US senator Bernie Sanders said in a statement provided to Reuters. “Taxpayers should not be providing billions of dollars in corporate welfare to large, profitable corporations like Intel without getting anything in return.”
I don’t think governments should be providing funding to multi-billion-dollar companies, and I don’t think they should be investing in them or picking winners and losers in markets. I also don’t trust that a precedent of taking stakes will stop at one company, and given examples like the report about Tim Cook’s interaction referenced in The Verge, I’m concerned about where this goes next. The Verge story is linked here.
Should the government take an ownership stake in a private chipmaker? It’s a question many will want answered before any deal moves forward.
Please share your thoughts in the comments below and join the conversation about what this means for the industry and public policy.
