The Trump organization’s bid to enter the smartphone industry with “Made in America” devices and mobile plans has made it a partner with a small network registered in luxury apartments at the beachfront Trump Tower Miami.
The business, led by the US president’s son, Donald Trump Jr., is pushing to tap Liberty Mobile Wireless to bring President Trump’s ambitions to the United States to leverage family brands and crack the mobile network market.
The US president has threatened to threaten a 25% tariff unless a company like Apple shifted production. This is a logistical challenge that industry insiders are unrealistic.
Trump Mobile is currently committed to offering the US-made smartphone itself. To accomplish this task, the Trump organization relies on a 7-year-old wireless company based in Florida, not a more established player.
Liberty Mobile Wireless, a Trump Mobile phone plan provider, was founded in 2018 by an entrepreneur called Matt Lopatin. The company is a “mobile virtual network operator” and is a business that purchases network capacity from AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, and sells it to customers.
These virtual networks have achieved some success in the US, with companies cashing in celebrity brands to provide alternatives to three dominant network providers. One network, Mint Mobile, was up front by actor Ryan Reynolds and later sold to T-Mobile.
Trump Mobile says its services are “driven” by Liberty Mobile Wireless, and its products and services are “not designed, developed, manufactured, distributed or sold” by the Trump organization or its affiliates.
Trump Mobile’s order form crashed after its release Monday. Wednesday’s employees were attributed to a rush of inquiries to buy Trump’s phones in advance and sign up for the plan.
The Liberty Mobile Wireless FAQ page lists five identical entries in the question “What is Lorem Ipsum?”. – “Lorem Ipsum is a dummy text for the printing and shipping industry.” The company is listed on LinkedIn as having fewer than 50 employees.
Liberty Mobile Wireless did not respond to requests for comment.
Business records show that the company is registered in a luxury apartment in Trump Tower, Miami. The application also states that owner Lopachin has established several small and medium-sized businesses over the years, some of which have been dissolved.
Eric Trump, Don Hendrickson, Eric Thomas, Patrick O’Brien and Donald Trump Jr. will be taking part in the Trump Mobile announcement at Trump Tower in New York last week. ©AP
At an event in New York to launch Trump Mobile, Donald Trump JR and Eric Trump introduced three executives (Don Hendrixon, Eric Thomas and Pat O’Brien) who led the company, citing the group of teams as “for hundreds of years in the mobile space.” Trump Mobile did not provide details about their background.
The team behind Trump Mobile is facing the difficult task of delivering American-made smartphones by September, as promised.
A Trump Mobile spokesperson said that the $499’T1″ smartphone “manufacturing is in Alabama, California and Florida.” Eric Trump previously revealed in an interview that the phone would be “finally” made in the US.
Todd Weaver, CEO of Purism, an electronic company founded in 2014 that manufactures smartphones in California, said he doesn’t think of a smartphone with specifications that Trump Mobile has promised to be able to do in the US.
Building a US supply chain has been a slow, “iterative” process, he said. “When I started, we knew we couldn’t build it right away. When we were planning on making the first call, we flew to China to see all the designs and learn the process.”
Purism’s devices are currently targeting more niche customers, including government agencies. Government agencies value the “secure” US supply chain and their own operating system. The trade-off is that Purism’s devices are not comparable to mainstream smartphones with technical capabilities and cannot offer the same range of apps as Google’s Android or Apple.
The Trump Mobile website details the specifications of devices similar to existing Android smartphones produced by Chinese companies such as Vivo and Umidigi.
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The T1 smartphone has also entered a segment that has been shrinking in the US in recent years. According to International Data Corporation, calls in the $400-$600 price segment were less than 5% of the market in 2024, down from 9% in 2019. Apple’s iPhone 16E was launched in February at a retail price of $599 for consumers tailored to budget-tuned consumers.
“This is a challenging price segment where smartphone brands can see a lot, as consumers either buy very cheap devices or take advantage of interest-free financing programs from US carriers,” says IDC’s Nabila Popal.
In addition to the challenge, a formal “US-made” label, meaning that it contains “negligible” foreign elements, requires “all or virtually all” of US-made products, according to Federal Trade Commission guidelines.
“Ultimately, Trump Mobile needs to balance the claims of the ‘Made in America’ brand with economics that creates something that appeals to the broader segment of the American population,” said Jeff Fieldhack, research director at CounterPoint Research. “This is a tall order and I haven’t seen anything approaching yet.”
