The “Made in the USA” T1 Trump Phone is an HTC U24 Pro

The much-hyped $499 T1 “Trump Phone” was initially said to be “Made in the USA” and would be released in September 2025. Later, that was downgraded to “Assembled in the USA.” due to the Trump Organization’s lack of engineering or supply chain expertise. Many assumed at the time that the “T1” would simply be a privacy phone that would be manufactured by someone else. After several delays, the first phones began shipping.

iFixit performed a teardown and concluded that the T1 is a 2024 HTC U24 Pro painted in gold – a device from a Taiwanese company, likely using design and supply chains from mainland China.

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Working with NBC News, the iFixit team examined both phones using CT scans, side-by-side teardowns, and even reassembled a working T1 using a motherboard from the U24 Pro. As for “assembled in the US,” that could be true, in the same sense that your phone technician might “assemble” a phone from parts sourced from someone else. Or it could be assembled in Guangdong, China, like the HTC U24 Pro.

iFixit sums it up: “What you have is not a ‘proudly American design,’ but a phone designed in China, built in China, with the vast majority of components coming from China. I find no sense of American pride in me. I’ve certainly felt it before, so I can confirm that it’s absent right now.”

Quinn Nelson of Snazzy Labs on YouTube also posted a comprehensive video of his experience ordering, unboxing, and disassembling the phone.

“From pre-order emails ending up in Gmail spam due to problematic DMARC files, to paying for the $47,45 Trump Mobile 47 Plan over the phone, the entire purchase experience was a disaster,” Nelson writes.

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