U.S. Steel Industry In Chaos After Trump’s First 100 Days

WASHINGTON, DC - As Americans examine the impact of President Donald Trump's first 100 days in office, one sector stands out as one that has been hardest hit by the administration's chaos and uncertainty - the U.S. steel industry, according to the Sierra Club's Industrial Transformation campaign.

Under pressure from Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), the Department of Energy (DOE) is weighing deep cuts to the Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations(OCED), recommending the termination of $9+ billion awarded to dozens of projects, includingthrough the Industrial Demonstrations Program(IDP), which supports the innovative production of American steel, aluminum, cement, chemicals, and more.

"The U.S. steel industry has been hit hard by the chaos created by the Trump administration in its first 100 days, and the president is not exhibiting any signs he has learned from his gaffes to course correct," said Yong Kwon, senior policy advisor with the Sierra Club's Industrial Transformation campaign. "Rumors persist that the Department of Energy will either dramatically curtail or wholly do away with grants to help manufacturing facilities innovate - including a proposed project with steel giant Cleveland Cliffs to upgrade one of its aged blast furnaces to be ready to run on green hydrogen. This is happening even as news emerges that Sweden and China are financing billions of dollars in ambitious public investments to make cleaner steel AND increase steel output from these advanced facilities."

The Trump administration's ongoing lack of a coherent strategy around tariffs has also contributed to automotive companiesreducing their purchases of steel from domestic steelmakers, triggering Cleveland Cliffs to announce plans to idle production this summer at its Dearborn, MI facility.

"While the Trump administration touted Hyundai's announcement of a new steel mill in Louisiana as "groundbreaking" despite the fact that it's replacing one fossil fuel (coal) for another (methane) to produce steel, an announcement from startup Electra to pilot first-of-kind technology in Colorado to use electricity and below-the-boiling-point temperatures to process the iron used in steelmaking has received no fanfare from the federal government," said Kwon. "This signals a worrying absence of forward thinking from the Trump administration, which is poor foreshadowing for America's steel industry - a sector that desperately needs to pursue innovative manufacturing technologies if it has any hopes of staying globally competitive over the next decade."

About the Sierra Club

The Sierra Club is America's largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, with millions of members and supporters. In addition to protecting every person's right to get outdoors and access the healing power of nature, the Sierra Club works to promote clean energy, safeguard the health of our communities, protect wildlife, and preserve our remaining wild places through grassroots activism, public education, lobbying, and legal action. For more information, visit www.sierraclub.org.