WASHINGTON (TNS) — U.S. Steel said it would welcome a federal review of its deal with Japanese-owned Nippon Steel Corp., which announced earlier this week it would buy the iconic manufacturer for almost $15 billion.
The Pittsburgh-based company said it supported a review by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, which is chaired by Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
“We respect the CFIUS process and will work with the appropriate parties for a thorough and successful review,” U.S. Steel said in a statement. “Japan is an important ally to the United States, and NSC [Nippon Steel Corp.] currently operates multiple steel facilities across the USA. NSC is a respected and trusted company that has made substantial commitments to support U.S. Steel’s United Steelworkers-represented employees and non-represented employees, communities, and customers. This will strengthen the American steel industry, American jobs, America’s national security, and America’s supply chain security.”
U.S. Steel’s comments follow the Biden administration’s request this week for a review of the transaction by CFIUS, which looks at certain deals involving foreign investment in the U.S. to determine any impact on national security.
“The purchase of this iconic American-owned company by a foreign entity — even one from a close ally — appears to deserve serious scrutiny in terms of its potential impact on national security and supply chain reliability,” National Economic Advisor Lael Brainard said Thursday. “This administration will be ready to look carefully at the findings of any such investigation and to act if appropriate.”
U.S. Sens. Bob Casey and John Fetterman, D-Pa., and U.S. Rep. Chris Deluzio, D-Aspinwall, have sought to block Nippon Steel’s purchase of U.S. Steel. They said the impact of new legislation funding infrastructure and green energy and providing incentives to encourage manufacturers to open plants in the U.S. could be blunted by the U.S. steel sale.
“The United States has acted to make the U.S. market the most competitive in the world and to reshore critical supply chains,” the lawmakers wrote earlier this week to Yellen. “Allowing for the ownership of a major industrial participant in infrastructure and clean energy investments to be acquired by a foreign entity would be a step backwards in our commitment to supply chain integrity and economic security.”
Three Republican U.S. senators — J.D. Vance of Ohio, Josh Hawley of Missouri, and Marco Rubio of Florida — also questioned the sale.
“Despite the absence of any security-focused deliberation on U.S. Steel’s part, domestic steel production is vital to U.S. national security,” the three Republicans wrote to Yellen. “NSC does not share U.S. Steel’s storied connection to the United States, and its financial interests are tied into those of Japan.”
But congressional experts said there is little Congress can do to block the deal.
“If an American company wants to be acquired by a foreign company, I don’t see anything Congress can do other than deplore it,” said Ross Baker, a political science professor at Rutgers University in New Jersey.
