Bad news for LEGO fans: You’ll no longer be able to order the vital pieces needed to complete your creations, and it’s all thanks to President Donald Trump’s ridiculous tariffs.
LEGO’s “Pick a Brick” service, which allows builders to order individual pieces that are different from pre-packaged sets, is no longer available in the United States or Canada because the Trump administration struck down the de minimis trade exemption policy.
This old policy allowed for items under $800 not to be charged import fees, enabling billions in commerce. Most of the pieces ordered via Pick a Brick were shipped from LEGO’s Denmark facilities. Under Trump’s new tariff regime, that now becomes prohibitively expensive.
But the elimination of the de minimis exemption isn’t just hurting LEGO fans. Products sold on services like Amazon and Etsy are getting hit with new fees, as are shipments from low-cost fashion retailers like Claire’s, whose recent Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing cited Trump’s tariffs as a contributing factor.
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On a broader level, tariffs are hurting the economy as shown in employment data, which is why Trump is pushing to have jobs reports put together by his loyalists instead of by experts.
But tariffs are also hurting leisure activities enjoyed by millions of people, like LEGO building.
Sony recently announced a price hike for its PlayStation video game system because of tariffs, following a similar move by Microsoft, who increased the cost of its Xbox game system for the same reason.
Physical gaming is also facing a tariff crunch. Materials for tabletop games are increasing in cost, putting some game manufacturers in arrears. And basic childhood toys are also hurting, with the toy industry expecting prices to go up for the holiday season.
But Trump doesn’t care.
“A young lady—10-year-old girl, 9-year-old girl, 15-year-old girl—doesn’t need 37 dolls. She could be very happy with 2 or 3 or 4 or 5,” he said in May.
Now if that “young lady” wants to complete a LEGO project, she’s out of luck once again.