Steel Talks Stall Before US-EU Summit, Risking Tariff Return

  • An accord is needed to avoid the return of Trump-era levies
  • Talks expected to continue to meet year-end deadline

A worker checks molten steel at a steel mill in Portage, Indiana. 

Photographer: Scott Olson/Getty Images
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The US and European Union failed to reach an accord on steel and aluminum ahead of a summit on Friday and are poised to keep negotiating until a year-end deadline, when tariffs would return on billions of dollars of transatlantic trade in the absence of a deal.

The deadlock deprives US President Joe Biden, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President Charles Michel from being able to announce a deal on the so-called Global Arrangement on Sustainable Steel and Aluminum at the meeting in Washington as hoped, according to people familiar with the discussions.