Apple supplier Foxconn’s Wisconsin factory short of 2019 jobs target for tax credits, state says
- Foxconn’s Wisconsin factory was hailed by President Donald Trump as proof he was reviving US manufacturing
- But for many the factory has become a symbol of failed promises in Midwestern states like Wisconsin that were key to Trump’s 2016 election
In a letter to the Taiwan-based company’s vice-chairman Jay Lee, Wisconsin’s economic development agency said Foxconn was a long way away from building the large TV screens it had proposed in 2017, when it promised to eventually create 13,000 jobs in the state.
The planned US$10 billion, 20-million-square-foot campus was hailed by the White House as the largest investment for a brand new location by a foreign-based company in US history.
But for many the factory has become a symbol of failed promises in Midwestern states like Wisconsin that were key to Trump’s 2016 election and are now closely watched swing states in the Republican’s bid to be re-elected on November 3.
Wisconsin’s Democratic Governor Tony Evers, who inherited a deal from his Republican predecessor to give Foxconn US$4 billion in tax breaks and other incentives when he took office in 2019, has sought to renegotiate the state’s contract with the firm.