Should Biden Block the Japanese Takeover Bid for U.S. Steel?

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Critics cite national security, but political concerns might be the real issue.

By Cameron Abadi, a deputy editor at Foreign Policy, and Adam Tooze, a columnist at Foreign Policy and director of the European Institute at Columbia University. Sign up for Adam’s Chartbook newsletter here.

The logo of Nippon Steel Corp. is seen at an office building at the company’s head office in Tokyo.

The logo of Nippon Steel Corp. is seen at an office building at the company’s head office in Tokyo on Dec. 19, 2023. (Photo by Kazuhiro NOGI / AFP) Kazuhiro NOGI / AFP

The Japanese company Nippon Steel has made a $14.1 billion takeover bid for the American company U.S. Steel. That deal is now under review by the Biden administration, which finds itself under pressure to block the takeover out of national security concerns but also on broader economic grounds—at the potential expense of its own economic principles.

Cameron Abadi is a deputy editor at Foreign Policy. Twitter: @CameronAbadi

Adam Tooze is a columnist at Foreign Policy and a history professor and the director of the European Institute at Columbia University. He is the author of Chartbook, a newsletter on economics, geopolitics, and history. Twitter: @adam_tooze