In 2002 the US put tariffs on steel, the WTO ruled against them, and the government repealed its own policy under threat of $2 billion in sanctions -- the largest penalty the WTO had ever authorized. In 2025 the government did it again, at double the rate, using a different legal doorway that the first attempt never tried -- and then went further than any tariff, taking a literal veto seat inside the country's founding steel company.