After months of controversy and vows on the part of Donald Trump to block it, a deal has been announced clearing the merger of U.S. Steel and Nippon Steel.
The Tokyo-based Nippon Steel announced in 2023 that it wanted to buy U.S. Steel for a record $14.9 billion. That announcement was celebrated by officials with both companies, as well as various industry analysts who said the combined purchase and merger would keep the Pittsburgh company, which was founded in 1901, in business.
In the days following that announcement, then-candidate Trump said that during his first term “We saved the steel industry,” before adding: “Now, U.S. Steel is being bought by Japan. So terrible.”
Now as the result of talks between the two companies, and a federal review of the proposed merger, Trump has signaled his approval of the merger, remarking that a partnership between U.S. Steel and Nippon “will create at least 70,000 jobs and add $14 billion dollars to the U.S. economy.”
Trump’s remarks came after a review of the proposed acquisition was made in April by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States. That body, in late May, gave its approval to the merger.
Although all of the details of the merger have not yet been released, it is known that the headquarters for U.S. Steel will remain in Pittsburgh and that the company will not lay off any current employees.
It has also been reported that Nippon has pledged up to $200 million for the development of a U.S. Steel research and development center in Pennsylvania.
U.S. Steel mills in Alabama, Arkansas, Indiana, and Minnesota are expected to receive some $7 billion in upgrades between now and next summer.
Nippon has additionally said it will spend upwards of $1 billion building a new electric arc furnace, otherwise known as a mini mill, in Pennsylvania.
Trump, in lauding the new details of the merger, said the company will also keep all its blast furnaces operating at full capacity for at least the next decade.
In a release issued by U.S. Steel it was said that the company “will grow bigger and stronger though a partnership with Nippon Steel that brings massive investment, new technologies, and thousands of jobs over the next four years.”
June 2, 2025
By Garry Boulard
