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BUSINESS Monday 30 July 2018
A25

Rising backlash as US firms seek Trump's steel tariff waiver

By RICHARD LARDNER mitted for tinplated steel
Associated Press it had already agreed to
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. purchase from China was
companies seeking to be among the denials. U.S.
exempted from President Steel had objected, call-
Donald Trump's tariff on im- ing the tinplate a "stan-
ported steel are accusing dard product" that's read-
American steel manufac- ily available in the United
turers of spreading inac- States. In fact, U.S. Steel
curate and misleading in- said it currently supplies the
formation, and they fear it material to Seneca Foods,
may torpedo their requests. the nation's largest vegeta-
Robert Miller, president and ble canner.
CEO of NLMK USA, said ob- The New York-based Sen-
jections raised by U.S. Steel eca Foods declined to
and Nucor to his bid for a comment. But in its waiver
waiver are "literal untruths." application, the company
He said his company, which said domestically-made
imports huge slabs of steel tinplate "is of inferior qual-
from Russia, has already In this Feb. 25, 2016 file photo, a truck carries a load at the Nucor Steel plant in Seattle. ity to imported material."
paid $80 million in duties Associated Press Seneca Foods also said it's
and will be forced out of unclear, at best, if U.S. sup-
business if it isn't excused Trump and European clear on the path to secur- group opposed to tariffs. "It pliers have the ability or
from the 25 percent tariff. leaders agreed this past ing an exemption. A single wouldn't make sense from willingness to expand their
U.S. Steel and Nucor are Wednesday not to es- company may have to the administration's per- production in the long term
two of the country's largest calate their dispute over file dozens of separate re- spective to design a pro- to meet the company's an-
steel producers. trade, but the tariff on steel quests to account for even cess that readily granted nual demand for the mate-
"They ought to be ashamed and a separate duty on slight variations in the metal exclusions." rial.
of themselves," said Miller, aluminum imports remains it's buying. That means a The Commerce Depart- Philadelphia-based Crown
who employs more than in place as the U.S. and mountain of paperwork ment declined to com- Cork & Seal, a manufactur-
1,100 people at mills in Europe aim for a broader to be filled out precisely. If ment for this story. er of metal packaging for
Pennsylvania and Indiana. trade agreement. The met- not, the request is at risk of Department officials have food and beverages, sub-
Miller's resentment, echoed al taxes would continue being rejected as incom- so far made public only a mitted a sharply worded at-
by several other executives, to hit U.S. trading partners plete. All this can be time- small number of their rul- tachment to its waiver ap-
is evidence of the backlash such as Canada, Mexico consuming and expensive, ings. plication that anticipated
over how the Commerce and Japan even if the U.S. especially for smaller busi- An analysis of the numbers pushback from domestic
Department is evaluat- and the EU forge a deal. nesses. by the office of Rep. Jackie manufacturers. American
ing their requests to avoid Miller bristled over insis- The requests are open to Walorski, an Indiana Re- steel mills, the document
the duty on steel imports. tence by Nucor and U.S. objections. The Commerce publican and one of the said, cannot meet aggre-
They fear the agency will Steel that steel slab is read- Department posts the ex- most vocal opponents of gate demand for tinplate
be swayed by opposition ily available in the United emption requests online to the steel tariff on Capitol and have no plans to in-
from U.S. Steel, Nucor and States. "That's just not true," allow third parties to offer Hill, shows that 760 requests crease their capacity.
other domestic steel suppli- he said. comments — even from have been approved while "We anticipate the U.S.
ers that say they've been His company isn't the only competitors who have an 552 have been denied. The mills will attempt to rebut
unfairly hurt by a glut of one looking overseas for interest in seeing a rival's department hasn't yet ap- this statement when they
imports and back Trump's a product described as request denied. But objec- proved a waiver request object to this exclusion re-
tariff. being consistently in short tions are frequently being that triggered objections, quest, but we encourage
U.S. Steel said its objections supply. California Steel In- submitted just as the com- according to Walorski's re- the Department of Com-
are based on detailed in- dustries, a mill east of Los ment period closes, under- view. merce to see through their
formation about the di- Angeles in Fontana, de- cutting the requester's abil- The congresswoman's of- manipulative attempt to
mensions and chemistry of scribed the slab shortage ity to fire back. fice also examined the exploit the rules of the ex-
the steel included in the as "acute" on the West Willie Chiang, executive more than 5,600 publicly clusion request process,"
requests. "We read what Coast and declared that its vice president of Plains All available comments and the application said.
is publicly posted and re- waiver request is critical to American Pipeline, told the found they were submit- Daniel Shackell, Crown
spond," said spokeswoman its survival. House Ways and Means ted on average about four Cork & Seal's vice presi-
Meghan Cox. Nucor did Aiming to rebuild the U.S. subcommittee on trade days before the end of the dent for steel sourcing, said
not reply to requests for steel industry, Trump relied last week that his company 30-day comment period. he's not optimistic about
comment. on a rarely used 1962 law had no opportunity to re- More than 50 percent of the company's chances of
The 20,000-plus waiver ap- that empowers him to im- spond to objections that the comments weren't de- getting all 70 of its waiver
plications that the Com- pose tariffs on particular contained "incorrect infor- livered until 48 hours or less requests approved. Eight
merce Department has re- imports if the Commerce mation" before the Com- before the comment win- have been granted so
ceived illustrate the chaos Department determines merce Department denied dow closed. It took depart- far primarily because the
and uncertainty ignited by those goods threaten na- its exclusion request. Chi- ment an average of nine metal specified in those
Trump's trade war against tional security. He added ang didn't say who submit- days to post comments requests is not made in the
America's allies and ad- a twist: Companies could ted the inaccurate infor- online after receiving them, United States. Twelve others
versaries. It's a battle that be excused from the tariff if mation. according to the analy- have been denied, leaving
critics of his trade policy, they could show, for exam- "The intent here is to re- sis. The most prolific com- 50 still to be decided.
including a number of Re- ple, that U.S. manufacturers strict imports on a broad menters were Nucor and "It's hard not to interpret
publican lawmakers, have don't make the metal they scale," said Richard Chriss, U.S. Steel with 1,064 and that the Commerce De-
warned is misguided and need in sufficient quanti- executive director of the 1,009, respectively. partment wants domestic
will end up harming U.S. ties. American Institute for Inter- A waiver request Seneca suppliers to have an edge,"
businesses. But there are hurdles to national Steel, a free trade Foods Corporation sub- Shackell said.q