WASHINGTON — You cannot have American steel without American mining — and President Donald J. Trump just put that truth on the White House letterhead. The September 28 release “Mined, Melted, and Poured in America” is not only an Iowa plant announcement. It is the autopsy of the anti-mining era — and the scoreboard of the comeback.

Democrats spent years making big projects impossible. The Obama Administration blocked a proposed northern Minnesota copper-nickel mine by denying federal lease renewals in 2016. The Biden Administration canceled those same leases in 2022, then banned mining for 20 years across 225,504 acres of the Superior National Forest. It revoked a key federal water permit for another long-stalled copper-nickel mine. It blocked a 211-mile road in Alaska that would have opened a major copper and cobalt district. In 2024 it piled new rules onto taconite iron-ore processing and coke ovens — the plants that feed American steel — while tariff loopholes kept foreign steel flowing in.

President Trump reversed those policies — and American mining is roaring ahead. In 2025, the United States surpassed Japan in crude steel production for the first time since 1999 and became the world’s third-largest steel producer. Raw steel output is up 9% since Trump returned to office.

Jobs and market share tell the same Golden Age story. Nearly 6,000 steelworker jobs have been added after almost 10,000 were lost under the prior administration. American mills now supply 84% of the U.S. finished steel market, up from 77% in 2024. Steel imports are falling as tariffs, permitting reforms, and energy dominance bring production home.

The factory floor is answering. New mill orders hit a record $17.3 billion in July 2026; domestic shipments hit a record $16.9 billion that same month. U.S. manufacturing has expanded for eight straight months. That is not a press release — that is an industrial base waking up.

Patriots should keep the Iowa mega mill and this mining reset on the same map. One is the plant. The other is the policy that made the plant possible. America First means ore in Minnesota, melt in Iowa, and steelworkers back on the clock.