President Joe Biden came out in opposition to the sale of U.S. Steel to a foreign competitor as he left one Midwestern battleground state and headed to another.
“It is important that we maintain strong American steel companies powered by American steelworkers,” the president said. “I told our steelworkers I have their backs, and I meant it. U.S. Steel has been an iconic American steel company for more than a century, and it is vital for it to remain an American steel company that is domestically owned and operated.”
While the statement concerns the sale of a single company to Japanese firm Nippon Steel, a deal that is under review from the Committee on Foreign Investment, it sends the political signal of Biden’s commitment to American manufacturing, labor unions, and blue-collar workers.
The sale itself was announced last December, but Biden’s opposition was announced as he left Wisconsin for Michigan, two manufacturing-heavy states he flipped from former president Donald Trump in 2020 and hopes to keep in his corner this year.
The president called United Steelworkers International President David McCall Thursday to “reiterate that he has the steelworkers’ back,” according to the White House, which appears to mean opposing the U.S. Steel sale. McCall has outlined his own concerns with the deal.
Trump came out against the sale in January, saying it’s a “horrible thing” and that he would “block it instantaneously.”
Both presumptive presidential nominees are pitching themselves as pro-worker, pro-American manufacturing politicians. Trump established his bona fides by implementing tariffs on China during his term in office, which Biden has mostly kept in place. After winning in 2020, the latter signed a $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill that he has touted as a boon for American manufacturing.
Trump has attacked free trade “globalists” within his own party and gone after Biden and Democrats over their aggressive support for electric vehicles, which the former president says will wreck the auto industry.
Biden’s latest move puts him in line with Trump on the U.S. Steel matter, taking away a potential line of attack.
“It’s a strong, more direct message to steelworkers that sounds very much like a Trump message,” said Dan Bowling, who teaches labor courses at Georgia State University Law School. “It’s a more direct appeal than a general statement like, ‘I’m the most pro-union president.’ That sounds great to say, but show us the money.”
Biden has already locked up the official support of most unions, though the United Steelworkers are among a few, along with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, yet to make an endorsement.
U.S. Steel is based in Pittsburgh, the second-most populous city in Pennsylvania, another Rust Belt state Biden flipped in 2020.
The Trump-Biden manufacturing battle leaves in the lurch free trade principles, which dominated the Republican Party for decades. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce released a statement that warned against politicizing the sale.
“Japanese investment in the U.S. supports nearly one million American jobs, and officials must be careful not to send a chilling signal to international companies that U.S. politics may put their job-creating investments in the U.S. at risk,” Chamber Vice President John Murphy said.
The situation puts each party somewhat at odds with its recent past. Trump’s relatively protectionist stance represents a shift from the GOP’s traditional free market stance, while Biden’s Made in America agenda holds similarities to Trump’s America First messaging.
At play are union households in the three Rust Belt states that could swing the national election with their votes. Union votes went 56% to 40% for Biden in 2020, which was twice the margin of 2016 Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton’s union edge.
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With Trump heavily courting union votes once again, Biden’s U.S. Steel stance is part of his attempt to keep those households on his side.
“A lot of you helped me in 2020, and we made sure [Trump] was a loser — he is a loser,” Biden said Wednesday in Wisconsin. “And we’re going to make sure that happens again, right?”