Steel On the Lakeshore

Updated at 9:14 a.m. ET

Mexico is putting tariffs on imports of U.S. steel and farm products — including pork, cheese, apples and potatoes — as it hits back at the U.S. for the Trump administration's tariffs on steel and aluminum products from Mexico, Canada and the European Union.

Signed by Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto, the decree also suspends the country's preferential tariff treatment of the U.S. It was published in Mexico's official gazette on Tuesday.

Updated at 6:37 p.m. ET

The Trump administration made good on threats to impose tariffs on some of the nation's closest allies Thursday, announcing it will no longer exempt Canada, Mexico and the European Union from previously announced levies on steel and aluminum.

The announcement was made in Paris by Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross.

The Trump administration has decided to hold off on imposing most of its tariffs on imported steel and aluminum until at least June 1.

Tariffs were scheduled to take effect at 12:01 a.m. Tuesday on imports from Canada, the largest U.S. supplier of steel and aluminum, as well as Mexico, Argentina, Australia, Brazil and the EU.

A source familiar with the decision says the administration has reached an agreement in principle with Australia, Argentina and Brazil, which may avoid the need for tariffs against those countries altogether.

President Trump's tariffs on imported steel aren't the first time the industry has gotten protection from the U.S. government. Not by a long shot. In fact, tariff protection for the industry — which politicians often say is a vital national interest — goes back to the very beginning of the republic.

In his book, Clashing Over Commerce: A History of U.S. Trade Policy, Dartmouth professor Douglas Irwin writes that protection for the metal producers began in the 1790s.

HAMMOND, Ind. (AP) — U.S. Steel will pay a $600,000 civil penalty and $630,000 to reimburse various federal agencies for costs and damages after one of its plants discharged wastewater containing a potentially carcinogenic chemical into a tributary of Lake Michigan, federal and state officials said Monday.

The U.S. Justice Department said those terms are contained in a consent decree filed Monday in federal court in which U.S. Steel promised to take steps to improve its wastewater processing monitoring system to resolve alleged violations of the Clean Water Act and Indiana law.

New tariffs on imported steel and aluminum are set to take effect Friday, and experts say Indiana will see both benefits and costs.

(THE CONVERSATION) President Donald Trump has been promising to save American manufacturing, and the steel industry in particular, since the presidential campaign. His attempt to follow through on that promise was the March 8  tariff increase on foreign steel and aluminum, arguing that the tariffs were necessary to protect U.S. industries and workers.

Trump joins a long line of presidents, both Republican and Democrat, who have used trade policy in an attempt to create or protect jobs – almost always in vain.

It's a normal weekday at the Port of Vancouver. That means by noon, piles of steel slab cover the work yard at the docks on the Columbia River.

"Steel is tied to about a third of our revenue. So that's pretty substantial," says Abbi Russell, communications manager for the Port of Vancouver in Washington state, the second-largest importer of steel products on the West Coast. In 2017, the port unloaded 712,834 metric tons of steel.

When President Trump announced tariffs on steel and aluminum imports this month, he said protecting the two industries was vital for national security.

"We want to build our ships. We want to build our planes. We want to build our military equipment with steel, with aluminum from our country," he said at a March 8 White House news conference.

In other words, the U.S. military should be as self-sufficient as possible, and not rely on other countries to supply the essential materials it needs for defense.

When the phone rings at the Republican Party headquarters in Mahoning County, Ohio, a 77-year-old retired hairdresser and former lifelong Democrat answers.

Connie Kessler is a recent GOP convert with a religious-like zeal to help her hometown elect more local Republicans. Sometimes she answers calls from voters; other times she updates the database — she does the kind of odd jobs she says she used to do for local Democrats.

If Donald Trump hadn't run for president, Kessler says she'd probably still be a Democrat.

Updated at 11:15 a.m. ET

Newly enacted U.S. tariffs on aluminum and steel imports have sparked a sharp reaction from around the globe, with several nations warning of an all-out trade war.

President Trump on Thursday made good on a promise to impose a 25 percent tariff on imported steel and a 10 percent tariff on aluminum imports. The levies are to go into effect in 15 days.

Many in the steel industry have been exuberant about President Trump’s plans to impose a 25 percent tariff on steel imports. But for those steel manufacturers that rely on imported semi-finished steel slabs to make their final product, it’s a different story.

Here & Now‘s Peter O’Dowd speaks with Brett Guge of California Steel Industries, who says his company would be hurt by the tariffs.

When President Trump announced plans to impose tariffs on steel and aluminum imports last week, he made clear he views a healthy steel industry as vital to the economic and military success of the United States.

But the industry is under threat from steelmakers in competing countries, especially China, which has emerged as by far the largest and most powerful producer on earth.

American steel manufacturers are excited about the Trump administration's plan to levy 25 percent tariffs on imported steel. They say the tariffs will level the playing field against big steel exporters like China.

But in one Michigan county that voted heavily for Trump, people are worried that tariffs could force a big local plant to shut down.

Beer, cars, baseball bats, airplanes: These are a few of the products that could face price hikes when new tariffs on imported steel and aluminum go into effect.

The move announced by the president on Thursday is intended to bolster the domestic steel and aluminum industries. Trump said that imported steel will face tariffs of 25 percent, and aluminum will face tariffs of 10 percent.

President Trump's promise to impose hefty tariffs on U.S. imports of steel and aluminum sent markets around the globe into a tailspin and prompted anger and threats of retaliation from major U.S. trading partners, raising the specter of a full-fledged trade war.

As the Trump administration sees it, U.S. steel and aluminum industries are in crisis, rapidly losing ground to foreign competitors and hemorrhaging jobs along the way.

But proposed import tariffs and quotas have other manufacturers worried that they'll become less competitive in the global marketplace.

How the administration responds to the problem is something Mark Vaughn is watching very closely.

PORTAGE, Ind. (AP) — Documents show that U.S. Steel failed to test a Lake Michigan tributary for a potentially carcinogenic chemical after a spill from one of the company's plans in northwest Indiana.

The Chicago Tribune reports the incident was the second time this year that the company's Portage plant dumped chromium into Burns Waterway.

Details about the failed testing were in an inspection report posted online Tuesday by the Indiana Department of Environmental Management.