President Donald Trump is unveiling Monday plans for a massive steel plant in Iowa that the White House says will be the largest in American history and promises to bring 1,750 permanent jobs to the state. The roughly $15 billion steel plant is touted as a major new investment and evidence that Trump's economic agenda is bringing heavy manufacturing back to the U.S. with just over a month until the midterms. It will create between 5,000 and 6,000 construction jobs during its first phase.
Trump is expected to make the announcement from the Oval Office at 2 p.m. alongside executives from Mesabi Metallics, a White House official told Fox News Digital. The company plans to build the facility using iron ore from its newly constructed mine in Minnesota. SEN KEVIN CRAMER: CHINA BUILDS FOR WAR WHILE AMERICA WAITS ON PERMITS The Iowa plant is expected to produce 7.5 million tons of steel annually in its first phase before eventually reaching 10 million tons per year, according to the White House.
The administration says that would make it the largest steel plant ever built in the U.S. If completed as planned, the project would represent a significant expansion of American steel-making capacity. At its planned 10 million tons of annual production, the Iowa plant alone would have output equivalent to roughly one-tenth of what the entire U.S. steel industry produced last year.
The project would also create a fully domestic supply chain, according to the White House, using iron ore mined at Mesabi's Minnesota operation to produce finished steel in Iowa. But the scale of Monday's announcement also comes with a long timeline: Mesabi does not expect the Iowa facility to produce its first steel until 2030. Trump has frequently highlighted large investment commitments as evidence that his tariffs and other economic policies are encouraging companies to build in the United States rather than invest abroad.
The administration has announced hundreds of billions of dollars in planned investments from foreign governments and corporations, many of which are designed to unfold over several years. Mesabi's Minnesota operation also illustrates the challenges that can accompany large industrial projects. The project traces back nearly two decades and encountered years of financing problems and missed deadlines before Essar Steel Minnesota filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2016.
It later emerged from bankruptcy as Mesabi Metallics, and Essar eventually regained control. The project has since made substantial progress. Mesabi has begun mining and commissioning work at the Minnesota operation, although commercial pellet production has not yet begun.
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