Nippon, US Steel file suit against Biden administration, union, and rival after $15B deal scuttled

Nippon Steel and U.S. Steel are filing a federal lawsuit challenging the Biden administration’s decision to block a proposed nearly $15 billion deal for Nippon to acquire Pittsburgh-based U.S. Steel. The companies in a separate lawsuit allege that the CEO of steel-making rival Cleveland-Cliffs, along with the head of the United Steelworkers union, worked together to scuttle the deal. The suits, filed Monday in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, and a federal court in Pennsylvania, allege that it was a political decision and violated the companies’ due process. Nippon Steel had promised to invest $2.7 billion in U.S. Steel’s aging blast furnace operations in Gary, Indiana, and Pennsylvania’s Mon Valley.