Hamilton Mayor Andrea Horwath is condemning newly imposed steel tariffs and warning they could affect “thousands and thousands” of local jobs.
She also called Monday for a continued “Team Canada” approach to mitigate tariff impacts she said would be “quite damaging” to the economy of the nation’s most famous steel town.
Late Monday, U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order imposing 25 per cent tariffs on all imported steel and aluminum, including from Canada, with no exemptions.
The abrupt move came barely a week after the president offered an apparent month-long reprieve from his original vow to impose tariffs on virtually all products imported from Canada.
Such across-the-board tariffs might have taken a $1-billion bite out of Hamilton’s economy, the city said — and created a “doomsday” scenario for Canadian steel producers, according to an industry association.
But even a more targeted tariff war would be “really quite damaging” to Hamilton’s economy, Horwath said in an interview.
“At the end of the day, this is a town that still does a lot of steelmaking,” she said. “We have thousands and thousands of people employed in primary steelmaking, but also in secondary processing as well.”
Horwath said she has spoken to both provincial and federal leaders about the importance of “fighting for us and with us.”
“I’m all in for this Team Canada approach,” she said, noting the local chamber of commerce is organizing an advocacy mission to Washington and city council is expected to formally direct staff Wednesday to explore the potential for “Buy Canadian” procurement options.
Details of the federal government’s response to the new tariffs were not immediately available Monday evening.
But Hamilton Liberal MP Chad Collins, who recently met with officials at ArcelorMittal Dofasco to talk about the threat, noted online that the tariffs violate existing trade agreements and that Canada will “take retaliatory action” to protect workers.
“We will not be bullied,” he said.
That long-running threat of tariffs was already hurting local businesses long before Monday’s announcement, according to city economic development and steel industry advocates.
Ron Wells, who heads the union representing Stelco workers, said Monday there has been a hiring freeze locally and “slow” sales since shortly after Trump was elected, threatening tariffs against Canada.
“They’ve told us sales are slow, the order books are low,” the president of USW Local 1005 said in an interview Monday. ”(A tariff war) is not going to help our business, obviously.”
Keanin Loomis, CEO of the Canadian Institute of Steel Construction, previously told The Spectator he was aware of contract cancellations, job losses and project disruptions blamed on the threat of tariffs. City economic development staff have also cited knowledge of delayed business expansions and shrinking orders for some companies.
The city dealt with similar Trumpian tariffs imposed in 2018, which lasted about a year before trade negotiations ended the spat.
Steel exports to the U.S. from Canada fell 38 per cent during the 2018-19 trade war, said McMaster University economics professor Colin Mang. A similar, sustained drop in demand for Canadian steel this time “would be pretty significant” for the industry, he said Monday.
“That would definitely lead to job losses.”
The 2018 tariff war hit some businesses harder than others.
In parliamentary hearings that year, family-owned Janco Steel of Stoney Creek reported its business in the U.S. dropped 60 per cent soon after tariffs were imposed, spurring cancelled orders and worries about potential layoffs.
“The success of Janco Steel’s business model is predicated upon having an open trade border with the United States,” senior manager Stephen Young told a parliamentary committee at that time.
The Spectator has reached out to Janco Steel about the implications of the latest tariffs, but has yet to hear back.
By comparison, Cleveland-Cliffs CEO Lourenco Goncalves — whose U.S.-based company recently took over Stelco — told reporters earlier this month he believes the Hamilton steelmaker will “benefit” from Trump’s tariffs, which he supports. He pointed to Stelco’s strong 2018 financial results to back up his argument.
Stelco was able to sell more steel domestically and at higher prices during a year-long steel tariff spat that started in 2018, enabling the company to make money and avoid layoffs.
Hamilton’s biggest steelmaker, ArcelorMittal Dofasco, has so far declined to comment publicly about tariff impacts.
But the head of Dofasco’s global parent company, ArcelorMittal CEO Aditya Mittal, noted in a recent earnings call with analysts that 25 per cent steel tariffs imposed in 2018 cost the company about $100 million per quarter. At that time, those costs were “more than offset by revenue,” he added.
The only guarantee in a tariff war is the cost of steel will go up on both sides of the border, suggested David Ogilvie, owner of Waterdown’s Service Steel and Manufacturing Inc., which supplies tool-and-die shops and special purpose machinery builders.
“We’ve been through this before … And the prices went up — way up. Everyone cranked their prices,” he said. “What that means is more of my operating line is going to raw materials.”
Ogilvie said he expects “some impact” from a tariff war, if it lasts — but added his small business is flexible enough to survive.
“I wouldn’t want to have 50 or 60 (employees). That’d be risky.”
The renewed tariff threat blew up on the Ontario election campaign trail Monday.
“This is the next four years. Shifting goalposts and constant chaos, putting our economy at risk,” wrote Progressive Conservative leader Doug Ford, who announced plans to go to Washington Tuesday to lobby U.S. politicians. Ford has cited the tariff threat as a reason he called an Ontario election more than a year early.
NDP leader Marit Stiles, meanwhile, made a campaign stop at a Tim Hortons on Ottawa Street Monday with labour leaders, including Wells from the United Steelworkers.
She criticized Ford for not doing more to “tariff-proof” the economy since 2018.
“I will fight like hell for every single job,” she said. “I will make sure the jobs here in Hamilton are front and centre.”
Liberal leader Bonnie Crombie slammed a “self-serving” Ford for calling an election in the middle of a trade war.
“You don’t see another premier who would think of calling an election at a time of crisis,” she said during a Toronto campaign stop.
