Although most of Tuesday’s conference speakers at Steel Market Update’s annual conference in Atlanta, Georgia felt that Section 232 was favorable, noting that improved national security was needed, trade attorney Lewis Leibowitz disagreed.
“I’ll get right to it,” he said. “The Section 232 tariffs and the China section 301 tariffs were the beginning signs of war, and for many people, this is a long overdue confrontation. The question is whether the methods employed will reach the intended objectives.”
He also disagreed with the expanded definition of national security.
“National Security was never defined in the [Section 232] statute. Commerce never defined it,” he said. “232 is a misuse of the statute, in my opinion. We also need to discuss the impact of tariffs, quotas, AD/CVD cases, and a variety of other things, on the US economy.”
He also pointed to falling steel mill stock prices, noting that Nucor’s stock is down by 26 percent in the last year, and that US Steel stock price is down by 64 percent in the past 12 months.
“This competition is not with imports,” he said. “Steel employment is flat, but the objective was to increase it. It’s not working. National security isn’t helped by the tariffs. Steel isn’t used to make military helmets and missiles. The national security argument is weak.”