Steel Buyers Enter Tariff Era as Trucks Are Halted

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An ocean freighter from India pulled into the bustling Port of Tampa Bay on March 11 loaded with hundreds of tons of aluminum destined for multiple U.S. stops. Abruptly, the entire shipment was ordered to be unloaded then and there.

The vessel, carrying aluminum for window frames and semi-truck parts, was supposed to make subsequent stops in Mobile, Alab., and Houston, but given U.S. tariffs set to commence the next day, the logistics provider’s client canceled the remaining destinations.

This is the kind of disruption that has been replicated across the country as U.S. President Donald Trump’s steel and aluminum tariffs played out. From the Florida coast to America’s heartland, ripples materialized with broad-reaching impacts on automakers, builders and consumers.

At 12:01 a.m. on March 12 U.S. Customs and Border Protection began collecting the 25% import duty on all raw steel and aluminum as well as on products. Trying to beat the tariffs clock, the Tampa Bay shippers realized it would be cheaper to deliver the Indian aluminum via expensive flatbed trucks to the other destinations than to pay duties the next day, said Jose Severin, a business development manager for Mercury Resources, the logistics provider.

“One particular client had a vessel making three stops in the states and had to drop everything on the first one because they wouldn’t have gotten to step No. 2 before the tariffs,” Severin said. “It’s really disruptive.”

Since Trump’s inauguration the cost to buy U.S.-produced steel has surged to the highest in more than a year. American aluminum consumers are ponying up rising shipping charges that Ford Motor Co. has warned could