Fourth-generation steelworker Vonie Long makes the armor plate needed to keep our military safe. He also fights to preserve America’s critical industry.
The Alliance for American Manufacturing recently released a new report calling for stronger policy measures to combat China’s massive, unchecked overcapacity — and we warned that failing to do so will result in a catastrophic loss of jobs and production in the United States.
But we know that it isn’t enough to hear just from us. Sometimes, things are easier to understand when you hear from the people whose lives are most effected by what’s going on.
That’s why as part of the report, titled SHOCKWAVES: The Ripple Effect of China’s Industrial Overcapacity on American Manufacturing and Factory Workers, we also spoke with people who work in the steel, paper, tires, and other industries who have seen firsthand the devastation caused by surging imports.
Vonie Long knows first-hand how important America’s steel industry is to our nation’s national and economic security.
For nearly 30 years, Long has worked at Cleveland-Cliffs Coatesville, a steel plate production facility that first opened its doors back in 1810, making it the longest-operating steel plant in the country. Today, the Coatesville mill is best known for manufacturing military alloy and plate products needed by the military. Long, himself a Navy veteran, was there during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, helping to manufacture the steel needed to protect American troops on the battlefield.
But Long also has seen first-hand the damage done to the steel industry over the decades thanks to the global steel overcapacity crisis, including plant closures and layoffs. Even when the government responds, Long said, it never seems to be enough.
Part of the problem is that the United States isn’t aggressive enough when it comes to trade enforcement, and when it does take action, it “always comes too late,” Long said in an interview.
In most instances, workers and manufacturers have to prove they have been harmed by unfairly traded imports, a process which can take years and a whole lot of money. Even when they win their trade case, it doesn’t ever seem to be enough.
“We always have to have injury before we have relief, and the relief never seems to be an improvement on our loss,” Long added.
Here’s another example. Back in 2017, President Trump announced a “Section 232” national security investigation into steel imports, one which eventually led to the president issuing a broad 25% tariff. That decision is widely credited as getting the U.S. steel industry back on track, allowing steel companies to make critical investments to modernize their mills and even begin to hire back workers.
But what people forget, Long noted, is that the initial Section 232 investigation went well past its deadline — something Long even was featured in a Time magazine story at the time talking about. Imports surged, as foreign competitors rushed to dump their products into the U.S. market ahead of the tariffs.
All of this led to the idling of a nearby steel mill in Conshohocken, Pa.
“It effected Conshohocken to the point where they had shut down production and actually moved workers to our facility,” Long recalled. “To this day, many of them workers are still with us, they’ve never gone back to Conshohocken.”
Long, who served as president of United Steelworkers (USW) Local165, also does not think enough is being done to remedy the injury suffered by workers when a plant shuts down. The expiration of Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) benefits for workers who lose their jobs because of unfair trade is one such example.
“Policy needs to be weighted more toward the worker,” Long said. “We see relief towards our employers, but it seems like we have to beg for benefits for the workers.”
TAA is “something that should have never expired, and it’s something that we shouldn’t have to beg all the time for,” Long later added.
Despite the challenges that face the industry, Long remains hopeful that American steelmaking will continue for decades to come.
“I’d like to see my grandchildren be able to do this type of work, and even their children. I won’t be here to see it, but I want to believe that steelmaking in the United States will be way beyond generations that I would experience,” Long said. “We know that we do it cleaner, and I’m biased, but I think we do it better than a lot of foreign manufacturing.”