Highlights

• Despite optimistic claims from USA Rare Earth's CEO about bipartisan support and strategic acquisitions, the U.S. rare earth response lacks the centralized orchestration of a true Manhattan Project—it remains federated, fragmented, and slow-moving.
• USA Rare Earth's acquisition of U.K.-based Less Common Metals strengthens the metal/alloy bottleneck but doesn't solve upstream mining, midstream separation, heavy rare earth vulnerability, or the lack of coordinated financing and demand signals.
• While bipartisan consensus exists, America still lacks heavy rare earth separation at scale, suffers from China's continued price control, and needs coordinated industrial mobilization—not just company-led enthusiasm—to build a functioning rare earth supply chain.

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Yes, a stirring vision—but understand, we are miles from a Manhattan Project.  Barbara Humpton, the new CEO of USA Rare Earth, paints an energetic picture: bipartisan momentum, government attention, strategic acquisitions, and a declared national urgency. Her optimism is welcome—and needed. America should be racing to build a secure magnet-to-mine rare earth ecosystem.

But let’s be honest with our readers

This is not a Manhattan Project, nor is it anything resembling an Operation Warp Speed for rare earth elements and critical minerals. Those efforts moved mountains in months. The U.S. rare earth response, by contrast, still moves like a federal agency trying to find the right conference room. The comparison is aspirational, not factual.

Still, Humpton is right to flag that the U.S. has not yet built a functioning rare earth market outside China. That is not bias—it is a sober truth known to every investor watching magnet-grade metal supply tighten like a violin string. And yes, to President Trump’s credit, more has been done to help America’s rare earth and critical mineral supply chain than any previous administration in decades.  So please don’t take the critique as pessimism.

The Weakest Link Strategy—Necessary, Smart, But Not Sufficient

USA Rare Earth’s acquisition of the U.K.’s Less Common Metals is strategically sound. LCM is indeed one of the few scaled non-Chinese rare earth metal/alloy makers. This is accurate, and it matters. Strengthening the metal/alloy gateway is one of the smartest moves any Western firm can make.

But scaling a bottleneck does not solve upstream mine permitting, midstream separation capacity, or heavy rare earth vulnerability, plus seamless integration with magnet production, plus other activities such as workforce development and downstream demand support over the next decade(s). No single company can “fix the supply chain” because the American supply chain does not yet exist in a joined form.

Humpton’s framing—_"go to the most fragile parts of the chain and invest"_—is correct but incomplete. Without coordinated financing, synchronized demand signals, and purchase guarantees, the downstream magnet sector cannot pull the upstream into existence.

This is where the comparison to Manhattan or Warp Speed collapses:

Both were centrally orchestrated. The U.S. rare earth effort remains federated, fragmented, and fragile. With the Manhattan Project, much was top secret. With the current administration, just about everything is announced in advance via press release.

The Bipartisan Glow—Useful, but Don’t Let It Fool You

Humpton calls rare earths “the most bipartisan issue in our government right now” [perhaps next to Epstein]. That may be true, but bipartisanship alone does not mine dysprosium or refine terbium.

Fortune’s framing introduces soft political glow—without interrogating whether the current federal posture matches the rhetoric. It doesn’t. Not yet. No long-term purchase guarantees. No industrial credit window. No tariff-backed market stabilization for magnet producers. No national ore-to-motor blueprint.

Calling this a Manhattan Project today is like calling a blueprint a skyscraper. The intention is there. The steel isn’t.

The Real Signal for Investors

Humpton is a serious operator, and her clarity on China’s dominance is refreshingly blunt. She is right that the market will ultimately sustain itself only after robust non-Chinese capability emerges.

But investors should note what Fortune did not say:

• The U.S. still lacks heavy rare earth separation at scale.
• Magnet demand is growing faster than Western capacity additions.
• China continues to set global price floors and ceilings.

USA Rare Earth is making credible moves. But America does not win this race by company-led enthusiasm alone. It wins with coordinated industrial mobilization—the kind Rare Earth Exchanges has called for repeatedly.  And we’re not there yet.

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