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| FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE December 5, 2001 |
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ROCKEFELLER, OTHER SENATORS, URGE PRESIDENT TO ACT QUICKLY
ON STEEL REMEDY WASHINGTON, D.C. – Last night, Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) and 23 other senators urged President Bush to expedite his decision on remedies for the U.S. steel industry. Under the Section 201 investigation, the International Trade Commission (ITC) found unanimously on October 22, 2001, that nearly 80 percent of steel products were affected by imports. Due to the harm to the domestic steel industry, the ITC must recommend a remedy to the President. The remedy is due at the White House on December 19, 2001. The President will then have 60 days to make a decision based on the ITC’s recommendation. In his letter to the President, Rockefeller emphasized the urgent need for him to decide on an effective remedy. The Senator noted that a steel company is going bankrupt at the rate of about one every nine days, and without a quick decision from the President the steel industry may not survive. Rockefeller added that every moment that President Bush waits to make his decision, a vital industry to our nation’s economy and defense slips deeper into crisis. Last week, Senator Rockefeller asked the Undersecretary for International Trade, Grant Aldonas, and Commerce Secretary Don Evans to expedite the Administration’s review of the ITC’s remedy recommendations at a Steel Caucus meeting. And again, yesterday, the Senator reiterated the urgent need for the Administration’s quick decision in another meeting with Secretary Evans. The full text of Senator Rockefeller’s letter to the President is attached. ### December 4, 2001 Dear Mr. President, We are writing to urge you to expedite your decision on relief to the steel industry when you receive the International Trade Commission’s (ITC) recommendation for a remedy under the Section 201 investigation you initiated because massive quantities of imports have caused serious harm to our domestic industry. Unanimously, the ITC found this to be the case. It is critical that you make your determination very quickly – after you receive the ITC's recommendations, if not immediately. Given how closely your Administration has been following the progress of this case since your initiation of the investigation, we believe you will have sufficient information to make a timely decision on relief. The plain fact is that if we don't get relief to our industry before the end of the year, we very well may lose many more manufacturers. While the International Trade Commission's findings in your Section 201 investigation are an important step in this process only you can provide the relief our industry needs, and only you will be able to make a decision in time to avoid additional injury to our industry. As members of the Senate Steel Caucus, we are urging that you act to ensure the U.S. steel industry get effective relief in a timely manner to save our steel industry and our nation's steel communities as well. The Administration that preceded you failed to act quickly in instituting a remedy after the Section 201 investigation on steel wire-rod products. The ITC delivered its remedy recommendations on time, but the Administration failed to act. It delayed a remedy decision and permitted further injury to the domestic industry. President Clinton wrongly ignored the 60-day statutory deadline. We cannot allow that to happen to the entire steel industry. The stakes are too great. We must learn from the mistakes of the past and provide swift and comprehensive relief to the steel industry. There is no doubt that the domestic steel industry is in crisis – more so today than at any other time during our long tenures as elected representatives. For decades, the U.S. market has been the market of first and last resort for foreign steel companies that are often subsidized, state-owned, or protected in their domestic market. Since the Asian financial crisis of 1998 first depressed foreign markets, the flow of foreign steel into the U.S. market has grown into a flood, often at injuriously low prices (roughly 79% per cent of U.S. steel imports is currently covered by anti-dumping orders). The result has been to depress steel prices in the U.S. market and push U.S. steel companies to the brink of bankruptcy. Twenty-five companies have declared bankruptcy since 1998 and a significant portion of those, including Bethlehem Steel, have asked for protection in the last six months. The U.S. steel industry has greatly welcomed the findings of the International Trade Commission – in many cases unanimously – that foreign imports are responsible for serious injury to the U.S. steel industry. These findings provide the basis for a comprehensive, and effective remedy that will give U.S. steelworkers the chance to, again, compete fairly in the global market. But, again, if the remedies imposed are to provide any meaningful remedy for the U.S. steel industry, they must be provided on an expedited basis. Creditors and financiers are circling U.S. steel companies, threatening to push more of them into bankruptcy or even into liquidation. The dramatic dip in the U.S. economy after the terrorist attacks of September 11 has exacerbated the situation further. In view of the urgent crisis in the U.S. steel industry, we request that you complete your consideration of a remedy as soon as possible after your receipt of recommendations from the ITC, but in any event, before the end of this calendar year. We have also asked the International Trade Commission to expedite its consideration of a remedy for the same reason we are urging you not to delay. Absent expedited relief, the actual relief provided for by the statute will for many affected companies simply be too late to make any meaningful difference. Many U.S. steelmakers will be forced to take measures which could be difficult or impossible to reverse, shutting down capacity and throwing thousands of more steelworkers out of work. We believe accelerating your decision on relief is the only way for the true purpose of the statute – the provision of measures to support a domestic industry crippled by a surge of imports – to be met. In closing, we would again like to express our deep appreciation for your initiation of this steel investigation. This 201 case is of enormous importance to thousands of steel workers, and tens of thousands of families, retirees and the communities that depend on them. More broadly, it is of tremendous importance to our nation, which needs to retain a domestic steel capacity, and to our citizens, who want to know, that America retains the right to take measures to help our industries respond to disruptive import surges. Again, thank you for all the work you have done on steel, however now it is time to make that work count by delivering an effective remedy quickly following the ITC's recommendation. Signatures on the letter asking President Bush to expedite his 201 decision Senator Jay Rockefeller Senator Arlen Specter Senator Robert C. Byrd Senator Mike Dewine Senator Richard Durbin Senator Mark Dayton Senator Paul Wellstone Senator Evan Bayh Senator Barbara Mikulski Senator Charles Schumer Senator Orrin Hatch Senator Byron Dorgan Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton Senator Rick Santorum Senator Max Baucus Senator Olympia Snowe Senator John Breaux Senator Jim Jeffords Senator Jack Reed Senator Harry Reid Senator Kent Conrad Senator John Ensign Senator Blanche Lincoln Senator Jeff Sessions | |