Friday marks President Trump’s visit to a U.S. Steel facility in the Pittsburgh suburbs, one week after he declared a “planned partnership” between the corporation and its rival Nippon Steel of Japan.
Mr. Trump described the agreement last Sunday as “an investment” and “partial ownership” that will be “controlled” by the United States, allowing U.S. Steel’s headquarters to stay in Pennsylvania. However, the administration has not disclosed many specifics regarding the agreement.
The most recent development in Nippon’s long-running pursuit of U.S. Steel was Mr. Trump’s announcement last week. In January, former President Joe Biden blocked its almost $15 billion attempt to purchase U.S. Steel on national security grounds.
After opposing the acquisition during the 2024 campaign, Mr. Trump has now become more amenable to a merger between the steel makers, claiming that the $14 billion investment will result in the creation of at least 70,000 jobs.
In an interview on Tuesday, Pennsylvania Republican Sen. David McCormick gave additional specifics about the plan, stating that U.S. Steel would have an American CEO and that the majority of its board members would be from the United States, a provision that was also included in the contract that Biden rejected.
In the most recent version, McCormick did bring up one possible distinction: the United States would receive a golden share.
“It’s a national security agreement that will be signed with the U.S. government,” McCormick stated. “There’ll be a golden share, which will essentially require U.S. government approval of a number of the board members and that will allow the United States to ensure production levels aren’t cut.”
According to McCormick, Nippon will own “certainly members of the board, and this will be part of their overall corporate structure.”
“They wanted an opportunity to get access to the U.S. market — this allowed them to do so and get the economic benefit of that,” McCormick stated of Nippon. “They’ve negotiated it, it was their proposal.”
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Whether the golden share clause applies to any U.S. ownership in the combined businesses is still unclear.
The Japanese corporation is making “flashy promises” that could jeopardize American jobs, according to the United Steelworkers union, which has opposed the sale.
However, U.S. Steel had issued a warning last year that the business would “largely pivot away” from its blast furnace plants in the absence of an acquisition, endangering thousands of employment. Without an agreement, the business claimed, the future of its Pittsburgh headquarters was also in doubt.
About 22,000 individuals work for U.S. Steel, with over 14,000 of them based in North America and the remaining ones in Slovakia.
