President Donald Trump took to Truth Social on Thursday, demanding that Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan resign immediately due to his alleged ties to the Chinese military.
“The CEO of INTEL is highly CONFLICTED and must resign, immediately. There is no other solution to this problem,” he wrote in between ads on his social media platform. “Thank you for your attention to this problem!”
The demand followed a letter sent by Senate Intelligence Chairman Tom Cotton on Monday. He wrote to Intel Chairman Frank Yeary to “express concerns about the security and integrity of Intel’s operations and its potential impact on U.S. national security.” The senator pointed directly to a recent criminal case involving Tan’s former firm, Cadence Design Systems.
The letter claimed that Tan allegedly controls dozens of Chinese companies and has stake in hundreds of Chinese advanced manufacturing chip firms — eight of these allegedly have ties to the Chinese military. Tan invested at least $200 million into these firms, according to Reuters.
Intel was granted $8 billion from the CHIPS and Science Act, the largest grant to a single American company. Tan, a technology investor and veteran of the semiconductor industry, was appointed as CEO of Intel in March. He previously led Cadence, an American chip design company based in California, from 2009 to 2021.
This push to resign comes after Trump threatened a 100% tariff on foreign-made computer chips, to push tech firms to invest more in the U.S., which would benefit American-made Intel.
