'The Buy American, Hire American President': Made-in-the-USA procurement chart
Page 5 of a White House report shows two bars, 'FY15+16' (red, $332.86 billion) and 'FY18+19' (navy, $418.82 billion), under a '26% Increase in Domestic Procurement' label. The vertical axis starts at $300 billion, which makes the right bar look several times the left; the text names the left window 'Obama-Biden' and the right 'Trump-Pence' and drops FY2017 as an overlap year. The comparison window was chosen by the author.
- Date
- October 2, 2020
- Period
- Contemporary
- Made by
- White House Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy (Trump administration)
- Region
- North America
- Country
- United States
- Medium
- Document
- Issuer type
- State
- Regime
- Trump Administration
- Leader
- Donald Trump
- Audience
- Domestic public
- Purpose
- Persuade or win support
- Techniques
- Card stacking
- Regime
- Trump administration
- Leader
- Donald Trump
- Source
- Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- Source
- National Archives (Trump White House archived website), retrieved October 2, 2026
- Rights
- Public domain (U.S. government work; whitehouse.gov copyright policy)
White House Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy, 2 October 2020, via the National Archives archived Trump White House website
Text on the object
President Trump’s executive order of August 6th, 2020, acts to bring this production back onshore. It requires government agencies like the Department of Defense, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), and the Department of Health and Human Services to Buy American when it comes to our essential medicines and the medical countermeasures we need to fight crises like the China Virus pandemic. 12 A May 1st, 2020, presidential order addresses a different set of offshoring risks. It prevents strategic opponents like Communist China from selling bulk power equipment to the U.S. 13 Such equipment might be compromised by Chinese malware or corrupted components– thereby putting our national electricity grid at risk. And Executive Order 13921, signed May 7th, 2020, will be a boon to America’s long-ignored commercial fishermen 14 by opening up new markets, removing unnecessary regulations, cracking down on the unfair trade practices of countries like China, and streamlining the aquaculture permitting process. Perhaps the best way to gauge the success of the Trump Buy American efforts is to compare the amount of domestically procured manufactured goods in fiscal years 2015 and 2016 under the Obama-Biden administration to fiscal years 2018 and 2019 under the Trump-Pence administration. Note here that Fiscal Year 2017 overlaps the two administrations so it is taken out of the comparison. [chart] MADE-IN-THE-USA GOVERNMENT PROCUREMENT USD Billions $450 / $425 / $400 / $375 / $350 / $325 / $300 26% Increase In Domestic Procurement 332.86 418.82 FY15+16 FY18+19 With this comparison, we see that domestic procurement rose from $332 billion in the Obama-Biden years to $419 billion in the Trump-Pence years, a 26 percent increase. 15 Moreover, when looking at the dollar value of Buy American waivers, 16 during the same period of time, this decreased by 8 percent. 17 5
