Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan has responded after Donald Trump accused him of being “highly conflicted” and said he should resign, according to The Financial Times. “There has been a lot of misinformation circulating about my past roles,” Tan said in a letter to Intel staff. “I wanted to be absolutely clear… I have always operated within the highest legal and ethical standards.” Tan said that Intel was engaging with the White House “to address the matters that have been raised and ensure they have the facts.”
Trump’s Truth Social post demanding Tan’s resignation reportedly came about due to letter to Tan from Tom Cotton, the Republican head of the Senate Intelligence Committee. In it, Cotton “expressed concern about the security and integrity of Intel’s operations” along with Tan’s previous work in China. Tan has invested in Chinese tech companies through his own venture capital firm, including SMIC (Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp.), China’s biggest chip maker.
In addition, a company that Tan ran before being appointed Intel chief admitted last week to violating US export controls by “unlawfully exporting semiconductor design tools to a restricted PRC [Chinese] military university,” according to the US Department of Justice. The company agreed to plead guilty and pay criminal penalties totalling over $140 million dollars.
Tan took over a very leaky ship with Intel, which has bled red ink over the failure of its foundry business to keep up with rivals like TSMC and win customers. Since taking the job, he launched a cost-cutting program and said that Intel may need to abandon its next-gen fab tech — which hasn’t shown great results to date — if it can’t find a large customer. In the same letter, Tan said Intel’s board is “fully supportive” of that work.
Trump has meddled with corporations ranging from Apple to Bank of America, making him what one pundit called “the most interventionist White House in my lifetime,” particularly for a Republican. “So many Wall Street folks worried that past Democratic administrations would interfere in their business,” said MSNBC journalist and lawyer Ari Melber. “But this first year of Trump’s second term has done so much more than any modern administration.”
