Trump's wild claim during defense summit baffles onlookers: 'Lies are getting dumber'
President Donald Trump's comments on Wednesday about legislation passed under former President Joe Biden left the internet stumped.
Trump made several unfounded claims about the 2022 bipartisan CHIPS Act, which was aimed at boosting domestic semiconductor manufacturing after global chip production came to be dominated by countries such as Taiwan, South Korea and other parts of Asia.
"We had this ridiculous CHIPS Act where you'd give billions of dollars to a company and they didn't even know what the hell to do with it," Trump said. "And of course, the standards were so high. If you weren't transgender, as an example, you didn't qualify. So they'd get the money, they'd hire, they'd look all over for transgender people to run the company. They couldn't find them."
Critics online were quick to react to his claims.
"The lies are getting dumber," James Singer, communications director for Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), wrote on X.
"The CHIPS Act funds the production of chips using leading-edge **transistors**. And now you can probably figure out why he thinks these companies needed transgender people to qualify. We are truly living in the dumbest of times," Melanie D'Arrigo, executive director of the Campaign for New York Health, who has more than 89,000 followers, wrote on X.
"Not just false, but utterly bizarre," criminal defense lawyer Scott Greenfield wrote on X.
"Don’t think this is true!" Tech and venture capitalist lawyer Dan Goldberg wrote on X.
"Conservatives: 'Stop making everything about gender.' Also Conservatives: 'Now, back to our 47-minute discussion of gender,'" the account SundaeDivine, a political commentator with more than 129,000 followers, wrote on X.
"He is a psychotic imbecile. My god," influencer account Spiro's Ghost, which has more than 243,000 followers, wrote on X.
"Republicans [SIC] officials spend more time thinking about transgenderism than even transgender people do. I'd recommend they schedule an appointment with a professional to discuss this obsession with," Jessica Reidl, fellow at the Brookings Institute, wrote on X.
"This is another lie," Democratic strategist Adam Parkhomenko wrote on X.
The lies are getting dumber https://t.co/lsn008Rci4
— James Singer (@Jemsinger) July 15, 2026