Nippon, US Steel file two lawsuits after Biden administration blocks $15 billion deal

By FATIMA HUSSEIN The Associated Press

FILE - This is a portion of US Steel's Edgar Thomson Works in Braddock, Pa., on Sunday, Apr., 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar, File)[ASSOCIATED PRESS/Gene J. Puskar]

WASHINGTON (AP) — Nippon Steel and U.S. Steel are filing a federal lawsuit challenging the Biden administration’s decision to block a proposed nearly $15 billion deal for Nippon to acquire Pittsburgh-based U.S. Steel..

The suit, filed Monday in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, alleges that it was a political decision and violated the companies’ due process.

“From the outset of the process, both Nippon Steel and U. S. Steel have engaged in good faith with all parties to underscore how the Transaction will enhance, not threaten, United States national security, including by revitalizing communities that rely on American steel, bolstering the American steel supply chain, and strengthening America’s domestic steel industry against the threat from China,” the companies said in a prepared statement Monday. “Nippon Steel is the only partner both willing and able to make the necessary investments.”

Nippon Steel had promised to invest $2.7 billion in U.S. Steel’s aging blast furnace operations in Gary, Indiana, and Pennsylvania’s Mon Valley. It also vowed not to reduce production capacity in the United States over the next decade without first getting U.S. government approval.

A second federal lawsuit has been filed against Cleveland-Cliffs and their CEO, Lourenco Goncalves, and the USW International President David McCall for allegedly trying to stop the transaction.

Biden on Friday decided to stop the Nippon takeover — after federal regulators deadlocked on whether to approve it — because “a strong domestically owned and operated steel industry represents an essential national security priority. … Without domestic steel production and domestic steel workers, our nation is less strong and less secure,” he said in a statement.

While administration officials have said the move is unrelated to Japan’s relationship with the U.S. — this is the first time a U.S. president has blocked a merger between a U.S. and Japanese firm.

Biden departs the White House in just a few weeks.

The president’s decision to block the deal comes after the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, known as CFIUS, failed to reach consensus on the possible national security risks of the deal last month, and sent a long-awaited report on the merger to Biden. He had 15 days to reach a final decision.