The News
US President Donald Trump on Friday cleared the path for Nippon Steel’s acquisition of US Steel, announcing a “planned partnership” between the two steelmakers that would keep the US company headquartered in Pittsburgh and create 70,000 new jobs.
Japan’s Nippon aggressively sought to salvage the $14.9 billion merger after former President Joe Biden blocked it on national security grounds, but it wasn’t until recent weeks that its efforts began to yield progress.
Nippon presented an economic analysis to a number of government and elected officials showing that its acquisition — with a dramatically increased investment amount, as Semafor has previously reported — would create thousands of jobs across the states that US Steel operates in, according to people familiar with the matter. Republican Sen. Dave McCormick also argued the deal’s case before Trump in a White House meeting Thursday.
That engagement also yielded a promise from Nippon to build a “greenfield” steel mill. Nippon hasn’t committed to where that facility will be built, but will allow states to compete for the project.