Foreign Steel Maker Gets Tariff Breaks In Exchange for Free Steel for the Trump Ballroom
Donald Trump’s massive White House ballroom has become a nexus of corruption before it even gets built. The latest news is that a foreign company offered to donate its steel for the ballroom—so much for “made in America”—and then promptly got a special break on Trump’s tariffs.
The New York Times reports:
President Trump has championed the U.S. steel industry, promising to strengthen it and to impose stiff tariffs on foreign metals to shield manufacturers from overseas competitors.
Yet…ArcelorMittal, a Luxembourg-based firm that is the world’s second-largest steel maker, is providing steel for the structure of the ballroom project, the people said. They said the steel was produced in Europe, where the bulk of ArcelorMittal’s production is concentrated.
The White House has not disclosed details of the donation, but Mr. Trump said last October that he had been offered a donation of steel for the ballroom valued at $37 million.
The president’s comments came just days before the White House made adjustments to its tariffs that could benefit ArcelorMittal, by cutting in half the tariffs applied to exports of automotive steel from its Canadian plant.
Note that Trump could grant this favor because he claims the sole, arbitrary power to set and alter tariff rates, including for specific countries and industries. But it’s fitting, in a way, that his ballroom’s entire construction process offers a preview of the kind of corrupt deals that will be made there—if it ever gets built.
The Executive Watch is a project of the Institute for the Study of Modern Authoritarianism, and its flagship publication The UnPopulist, to track in an ongoing way the abuses of the power of the American presidency. It sorts these abuses into five categories: Personal Grift, Political Corruption, Presidential Retribution, Power Consolidation, and Policy Illegality. Click the category of interest to get an overview of all the abuses under it.
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