So by paying a 25% tariff, developing in china outside "free-trade" zones none of tesla technical manufacturing/design knowledge will be leaked to the government and knockoff competitors?

Good luck w/that.

One can only assume tesla expects some level of compromised proprietary secrets. Calculated risk on some level. Maye they see this as speeding up the inevitable.

Apparently they figure this risk is outweighed by the benefit of employing a manufacturing powerhouse which surpasses their US productions.