What would it cost, realistically to print and publish these in the US? Is it not mostly just laminated paper on cardboard with some resin pieces?

The big issue AIUI is die-cut cardboard. The vast majority of modern board games come with several sheets of it to punch out small pieces (think coins or victory point chips).

Producing these (and other game components) requires specialized machinery which isn't made in the US. So even if someone did want to set up a board game manufacturing company in the US, they would now be hit by tariffs as they bought the machines they need.

Stegmaier says that possibly games where all the components are cards will be less affected, as there are companies in the US printing playing cards.

The article and follow up comments addresses that. As an example when talking about just the box the game comes in, "the quotes I’ve gotten in the US–even from companies that specialize in making boxes–are literally almost the cost of making the entire game". He also mentions that some of the machines needed to make certain pieces don't exist in the US and would have to be imported from China, and thus you'd have to pay tariffs on the machines.

He does mention that he's started to think about fundamentally redesigning his future games in a way that makes it possible to cheaply manufacture and package them in the US.

I think the problem is mostly plastic components, especially miniatures. These requires injection molds and then manual labor to remove the parts from the sprues, clean them and glue them together (as miniatures are expected to come assembled in board games).

I think the labor cost alone makes it not possible to manufacture them in the west. But also ignoring that, consider that injection molding for miniatures can be more expensive in the west in itself. Usually because factories work on a different scale and have higher requirements for minimum order quantities, but also because they do not work usually with miniatures so they would need to adapt their tooling, expertise and know how for this specific kind of product.

Imagine a factory injection molding chairs suddenly receiving a quote for a bunch of miniatures, they can do it, but they are going to charge you for the time needed to figure out how, and for the changes in the lines.

Consider also that usually miniatures 3D files are stl or obj because they are sculpted, while the factory might work only with cad as that's the standard in manufacturing. These two are radically different and there is no easy conversion from stl to cad, which would require it being re-modeled in most cases.

Also, with a chinese factory you can expect to give them 3D files and they will take care of everything (designing molds and avoiding undercuts). I'm sure this has separate cost in the west as it involves a specialized expertise which is for sure more expensive than in China.

Btw here's a nice writeup from a person that tried to open a game factory in the USA, he doesn't even mention plastic parts though. https://www.superheumann.com/post/my-year-in-manufacturing-g...