In 2018, President Donald Trump implemented Section 232 tariffs on aluminum and steel to protect American producers from a flood of unfairly priced imports threatening our national security.
The impact of the Trump tariffs was immediate: Century Aluminum, America’s largest producer, restarted idle production lines; Alcoa expanded operations; U.S. aluminum production surged; and a key industry undergirding our national security was reborn.
Enter President Joe Biden: He handed out a complex web of exemptions for other countries and alternative trade arrangements that severely weakened the effectiveness of the Trump tariffs. Predictably, imports once again surged, and by 2024, U.S. aluminum capacity utilization had plummeted to a dangerous 52%, with smelters shutting down and American jobs disappearing.
Now, President Trump is taking bold action once again. He has raised the aluminum tariff from 10% to 25% while eliminating all country-specific exemptions.
This decisive move sends a clear message: The era of unchecked imports undermining American industry is over. The United States will no longer be a dumping ground for heavily subsidized and unfairly traded aluminum.
Predictably, foreign nations are complaining about the new Trump aluminum tariffs. Yet, history needs to be our guide because every one of the countries that benefitted from exemptions or alternatives to the tariff abused the privileges America granted them.
