“Foreign governments have successfully lured film and television productions, and the multitude of jobs they create, away from the United States with aggressive tax incentives and subsidies. Films intended for initial release in the U.S. are increasingly being shot overseas—and American workers and our economy are paying the price.”

The entertainment industry has taken an unrelenting beating over the past several years—streaming wars, the COVID-19 pandemic, mergers and layoffs, strikes, and accelerating runaway production have gutted the industry, leaving record numbers of people without work and little hope of a rebound. Runaway productions generally refer to productions intended for release or broadcast in the United States that are actually filmed in another country, or those made by Los Angeles-based studios that shoot in other states in order to take advantage of competitive tax incentives or other economic benefits.

Calling incentives offered to lure production overseas a “concerted effort” by other nations and thus a national security threat, the president said he was authorizing the Department of Commerce and the U.S. trade representative to immediately begin instituting 100 percent tariffs on “any and all movies coming into our Country that are produced in Foreign Lands.”

How exactly tariffs on foreign films would work—or what even constitutes a U.S.-made or foreign-made film in the age of streaming, co-production, and globalized post-production—is yet to be determined.

Unlike most of Trump’s trade-related actions thus far, this latest salvo targets not physical goods that come through U.S. ports, but digitally transmitted services that rely on an increasingly international supply chain.

The impulse, at least, was appreciated among representatives of Hollywood’s beleaguered workforce.

“Studios chase cheap production costs overseas while gutting the American workforce that built the film and TV industry,“ Teamsters President Sean M. O’Brien and Motion Picture and Theatrical Trade Division Director Lindsay Dougherty said in the statement. ”These gigantic corporations line their pockets by relentlessly cutting corners, abandoning American crews, and exploiting tax loopholes.”

The union’s Motion Picture and Theatrical Trade Division represents drivers and transportation professionals as well as casting directors, animal wranglers, and other craftspeople.

“We thank President Trump for boldly supporting good union jobs when others have turned their heads,“ the statement reads. ”This is a strong step toward finally reining in the studios’ un-American addiction to outsourcing our members’ work. The Teamsters applaud any elected official—Republican, Democrat, Independent—who’s willing to fight for American workers.”

The president’s missive appeared to address the fact that an increasing number of U.S. studio films are shot abroad—primarily in Canada, the UK, Australia, and European countries such as Hungary, which offer competitive subsidies and tax breaks, easy regulatory environments, and lower labor costs for producers trying to deliver a project on budget.

IATSE, which represents members in the United States and Canada, also struck a cautious tone, saying it supports all policy measures “that can be implemented to return and maintain U.S. film and television jobs, while not disadvantaging ... Canadian members.”

IATSE urged federal policymakers to level the playing field for U.S. productions, including with a federal film production tax incentive, but said it would await further information about the administration’s proposed tariff plan.

“We continue to stand firm in our conviction that any eventual trade policy must do no harm to our Canadian members—nor the industry overall,” it said.

Vancouver, Canada; Toronto; the UK; Central Europe; and Australia dominated the list, with U.S. hubs California, Georgia, and New Jersey ranked below them.

“Key factors influencing these preferences include favorable tax incentives, infrastructure, available skilled crew, and currency exchange rate,” the report states, noting that an increasingly competitive market of tax incentive schemes will likely shape geographic distribution for years to come.

“The lower volumes are here to stay,” the report reads, noting that the number of U.S. productions that started principal photography in the second quarter of 2024 fell by nearly 40 percent from 2022 levels, compared with a 20 percent global dip.

“Each drop reflected the impact of global production cutbacks and California’s ongoing loss of work to rival territories,” the organization said in an April statement.

There is no central database or reliable way to track runaway production, which has been a subject of concern for Hollywood unions for at least the past two decades. But in the industry, many say that it has accelerated over the past five or so years at an unprecedented rate.

“If this tariff policy is just a headline reaction to productions leaving the U.S., it’s not a solution, it’s sabotage,” David Graves, an executive board member with IATSE Local 728, which represents studio electrical lighting technicians, told The Epoch Times in a text message.

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Stressing that the film industry does not run on the same timeline or structure as a brick-and-mortar business, Graves said a one-size-fits-all approach may do more harm than good unless informed by people who work in the industry.

“If the administration truly wants to understand how to apply tariffs to the American film industry, they need to talk to electricians, grips, camera operators, and wardrobe, not just A-list actors who are disconnected from the realities of payroll taxes, foreign incentives, and what economic contraction looks like on the ground,” Graves said.

Big-name producers and celebrity voices, he said, “don’t speak for the working-class crews who are watching their livelihoods disappear with no transition plan, no retraining support, and no safety net.”

A day after Trump’s tariff announcement, Oscar-winning actor Jon Voight, whom Trump previously named a “special ambassador” to Hollywood, said in a video posted to social media platform X that he had submitted a detailed plan to the president at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida outlining “certain tax provisions” that would help both movie and TV production.

“Our industry recently has suffered greatly,“ Voight said. ”Many Americans have lost jobs to productions gone overseas. People have lost their homes, can’t feed their families.”

In an emailed statement to The Epoch Times, Steven Paul, adviser to Voight and CEO of SP Media Group, said the document published by Deadline was “part of a private discussion and was never intended for public consumption.”

The proposal was crafted “solely for the purpose of discussion,” Paul said, and does not reflect any formal policy or position. And while the ideas listed were gathered from exploratory conversations Voight and Paul had with a broad range of industry stakeholders, including unions, studios, and streaming platforms, Paul said the leaked proposal “does not claim to represent the collective views of the participating film and television organizations.”

All of this would apply to content across the board, including for theatrical distribution, broadcast networks, cable, streaming services such as Netflix and Amazon, and digital platforms such as YouTube.

The draft plan calls for a steep tariff for U.S.-based productions that elect to produce in a foreign country—120 percent of the value of the foreign incentive.

“This is not meant as a penalty, but as a necessary step to level the playing field, while not creating a never-ending cycle of chasing the highest incentive,” the document reads.

The draft plan also addresses “California-specific issues,” including the state’s “woefully inadequate” tax incentive, and calls Hollywood an “endangered species.”

California Gov. Gavin Newsom was quick to respond, suggesting that the state and federal government collaborate on a $7.5 billion federal tax incentive.

“California built the film industry—and we’re ready to bring even more jobs home,” Newsom wrote in a post on X. “We’ve proven what strong state incentives can do. Now it’s time for a real federal partnership to Make America Film Again. @POTUS, let’s get it done.”

If tariffs, or a combination of tariffs and increased domestic incentives, bring jobs back to the United States, Graves said, the next question is whether the United States has the infrastructure to support the volume of work.

“Foreign markets will respond faster than Washington can legislate,“ he said. ”They will offer accredited investors more stable, reliable opportunities—boosting their liquidity, increasing mid-budget productions, and creating consistent employment pipelines abroad that the U.S. cannot currently match.

“The American film industry is not made up of the wealthy. It is built by the middle class. ... When it comes to job creation and labor stability, it is not the blockbuster films that create employment at scale. It is the steady, mid-tier productions that do the heavy lifting.”

The data rely on the self-reported countries of origin found on the Internet Movie Database (IMDb).

“There is no universal database or framework for defining or verifying a film’s national identity,” Follows wrote in a Substack post following Trump’s announcement.

“IMDb allows producers to self-report, while awards bodies, festivals, and national funds each apply their own criteria. These systems often conflict, leading to different answers depending on who is asking and why.”

Further, he pointed out, many films today are co-productions between two or more countries, with streaming platforms such as Netflix routinely commissioning projects with no clear country of origin.

“A project might be developed in L.A., produced by a UK company, shot in Spain, and marketed as ‘international content,'“ he wrote. ”Principal photography might take place in more than one country, while post-production—special effects, editing and music—is increasingly a global phenomenon, outsourced to centers with burgeoning infrastructure in countries such as Canada, the U.K., New Zealand. and India.”

Any plan to impose tariffs would require a consensus on what determines a film’s national identity.

“Currently, the United States has no formal definition of what makes a film American,“ Follows wrote. ”There is no certification process, no threshold of domestic content, and no single agency responsible for determining national status.”

According to Follows’s analysis, in 2019, about 24 percent of films made by Hollywood studios had at least one day of filming in the UK, and more than 19 percent had some photography in Canada.

If the president’s plan follows Voight’s recommendations, a requirement that “American-made” films and shows have at least 75 percent of production and post-production done in the United States might be a starting point.

Patrick Adler, co-founder of Westwood Economics and Planning Associates and co-author of the Otis report, said the new reality is that Hollywood is more managerial, and best understood as a kind of Silicon Valley.

“Hollywood itself is not a place where films and TV shows get made, or where they get shot,” he told The Epoch Times in late 2024. “It’s a place where they’re generated—it’s like the brain, the nerve center of the industry, a huge management area and that hasn’t gone anywhere. It’s not going anywhere.”

He noted that Silicon Valley used to build chips and now outsources that function.

“No one ever says, ‘Silicon Valley is done because they don’t make silicon chips anymore,’“ he said. ”But for some reason, Hollywood people say Hollywood is dead because there’s runaway production. Well, production is a lot more like manufacturing silicon chips than doing the kind of core, value-added stuff.

“It’s not all about shooting.”

Tariffs, should they be implemented, could affect U.S. studios that co-produce and outsource various parts of a diverse international supply chain more than they would affect foreign-made film studios, which do not have anywhere near the economic or cultural power that U.S. studios do.

Graves cautioned against underestimating the response from foreign trading partners.

“Countries like Canada, the UK, and Australia have developed robust federal agencies dedicated to attracting film production,” he said, noting that one of the main reasons mid-tier productions—those budgeted between $6 million and $35 million—are no longer viable in the United States is that we do not have federal infrastructure to support them.

Such films are disappearing because investors cannot justify the risk, not because there is a lack of demand, according to him.

“Other countries have studied this,“ he said. ”They understand that these smaller productions generate significant jobs with far less taxpayer investment. In response, they have created streamlined production and distribution incentives that we simply do not have, especially not at the federal level.”

By enacting 100 percent tariffs on all foreign content entering the U.S. market, he said, the United States could be grossly underestimating the competition’s ability to adapt.

Such foreign-incentivized production would presumably be a primary target of tariffs aimed at revitalizing U.S.-based production, although the Trump administration has not offered details. A White House spokesperson followed Trump’s initial announcement with a statement that “no final decisions have been made” and that the administration was “exploring all options” to deliver on the president’s directive.

The Department of Commerce did not immediately respond to detailed questions about how the tariffs might work.

Michael Beavan, CEO of the Production Guild of Great Britain (PGGB), struck a conciliatory tone in an emailed statement to The Epoch Times.

“PGGB stands shoulder to shoulder with our U.K. film partners to make sure that we protect both our world-class film industry and freelance workforce at this time of uncertainty around U.S. tariffs,” Beavan said.

“We have a long and mutually beneficial relationship with our U.S. filmmaker colleagues and friends, which will always be celebrated for its creativity and collaboration, regardless of geographical or political boundaries. We see no reason for this unquestionably successful partnership to be disrupted now or in the future.”

A media representative for the guild said it is working with representatives from the UK’s screen agencies, broadcasters, studios, and streamers to formulate a response to the proposed tariffs.

Philippa Childs, head of Bectu, which represents 40,000 workers in the entertainment and media industries in the UK, said in a statement that the tariffs, coming after the COVID-19 pandemic and the global slowdown, “could deal a knockout blow to an industry that is only just recovering and will be really worrying news for tens of thousands of skilled freelancers who make films in the UK.”

The government, she said, “must move swiftly to defend this vital sector, and support the freelancers who power it, as a matter of essential national economic interest.”