Apple may have just discovered a new way to wriggle through Donald Trump’s trade war. As The Verge first reported, the company’s new method is quite simple: play to Trump’s ego. On Wednesday, Trump announced that Apple would be exempt from a 100 percent tariff on semiconductors that was set to take effect within the next few weeks, according to Reuters. The move could have made iPhones dramatically more expensive in global markets. The exemption came the same day that Apple committed to an additional $100 billion in US investments and gifted Trump a personalized statue.

Apple CEO Tim Cook said the statue was made by Corning, an Apple supplier that makes specialty glass for iPhones. It was designed by a former US Marine Corps corporal now working at Apple. He had a large circle of glass cut, then chiseled away at its edges to leave a stark Apple logo in the center. Cook said the statue came from Utah and had a 24-karat gold base with Trump’s name engraved on it. Cook, in turn, added a handwritten message reading “Made in America.”

Trump, who has been goading corporations to manufacture more domestically, seemed to appreciate the symbolism. When Cook presented the gift in the Oval Office, Trump said that Apple and any other company that manufactures factories in the US would pay “no charge” when the semiconductor tariffs take effect. It’s a huge win for Apple, which has been in the public doghouse with Trump for months over its supply chain location.

Apple has had a bumpy spring in Trump’s court. The president has long been nagging Apple to move iPhone production into the US instead of India, where Apple was in the process of moving part of its supply chain. In April, Trump said his trade war with China would lead to “Made in America” iPhones. In May, it sounded more like a threat. Trump went off on Cook during a trip to the Middle East. “I have a little problem with Tim Cook because of what he’s been saying,” he said. Trump reportedly called Cook and said, “We are treating you really good, we put up with all the plants you built in China for years. We are not interested in you building in India.”

Analysts have said it would be incredibly difficult to move iPhone assembly to the US, if it’s even possible at all. Still, Trump’s administration has doggedly advanced this idea. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said last year that Apple was looking at “robotic arms” to mimic the precision of Chinese factories and make iPhones in the US.

But Trump seems to have backed down from his hardline demands in Wednesday’s announcement. Previously, the president had suggested a 25 percent tariff on Apple in the absence of US assembly. Now he is framing Apple’s new investments as “a significant step toward the ultimate goal of ensuring that iPhones sold in America also are made in America.” He’s willing to wait, for now.

Cook did say on Wednesday that semiconductors, glass, and Face ID modules for iPhones are already made in the US. But he gave no firm indication of when the rest of the assembly might come. He suggested that the US assembly was still “a while away.”

Apple has used this playbook before during Trump’s first term. Cook is well-practiced at cajoling the president with promises of US investment, even if it means sidestepping his harshest demands. In 2017, for example, Trump claimed Apple was building three “big, beautiful” new plants in America. Only one was ever built—and it made face masks instead of iPhones. In 2019, Trump took a tour of a Texas plant and declared it could churn out iPhones. Apple instead dedicated the plant to making MacBook Pros. iPhones are still made in Asia.

Apple has now promised to spend $600 billion in the US over the next four years. The $150 billion of that is in addition to prior investments that Trump has claimed credit for, though that money is also from previous years. Wall Street has long known that the $600 billion number tracks with Apple’s typical spending in the US and is not far from the investment levels Biden or Trump’s first term had expected.

But Trump has threatened to hit companies with retroactive tariffs if they fail to follow through on those pledges. As things currently stand, Apple will continue with its investment plans but keep iPhone assembly elsewhere. It’s been on that course for a while, and it does not appear to be changing the calculus for tariffs. Trump is not forcing the issue, at least not yet.