Trump Promised to Protect Steel. Layoffs Are Coming Instead.<br />“You don’t want to splurge for your kids like you want to, because the plant may be closing.”<br />While he didn’t support Mr. Trump, Mr. Smith said he hoped that the president would follow through on his plans.<br />But Scott Paul, the president of the Alliance for American Manufacturing, a trade group<br />that represents steelworkers, said he had “a profound sense of frustration that the president has been using steelworkers as political props<br />James Rockas, a spokesman for the Commerce Department, said the administration was “aware of the plight of American steelworkers<br />and will continue working to halt unfair trade practices that harm our economy and kill American jobs.”<br />In 2008, before the financial crisis struck, the plant ran around the clock.<br />In a shift in the politics of trade, the union has defended the Trump administration’s trade agenda<br />against the criticisms of traditionally Republican business groups, like the Chamber of Commerce.<br />“I think the White House is immobilized, because they have such a cacophony of voices,” said Senator<br />Sherrod Brown, a Democrat from Ohio who describes himself as an ally of the president on trade.<br />Imports have risen during President Trump’s first year in office, a trend<br />that the steel industry attributes to the administration’s threat of strict restrictions on imports to come.
