Political Quotes

“Mr. Chairman, on December 19, 2000, the Export-Import Bank approved an $18 million loan guarantee to modernize and improve production at Benxi Iron and Steel, China. The Department of Commerce has found Benxi's dumping margin on hot rolled carbon steel products to be 67 percent. So if it costs $100 to make and sell steel in China, they are selling it in the U.S. for $59. The Ex-Im Bank was urged against making this loan by former Secretary of Commerce Minetta and a bipartisan congressional coalition, but the Export-Import Bank still offered the loan guarantee to the Chinese company. The bank's action will increase the production of more steel in a world market which already has an excess raw steel production capacity of 270 million metric tons excess. The last few years have been disastrous for the steel industry. Bankruptcy at, for instance, Ohio CSC, Republic Technologies and LTV were not caused by a crisis in the economy, but in fact demand for steel has been at record levels in recent years. These problems were caused primarily by unfairly traded imports that have led the Department of Commerce to approve a number of anti-dumping orders on a variety of steel products.”