Trump just banned Canadian booze — but there’s a big catch

Elisabeth Buchwald, Matt Egan, CNN
Tue, September 29, 2026 

Bottles of Canadian whisky at a Liquor Control Board of Ontario (LCBO) store in Toronto, Ontario, on September 29, 2026. - Cole Burston/Bloomberg/Getty Images

President Donald Trump's ban on Canadian booze kicked in on Tuesday, an unprecedented move that underscores the breakdown in one of the closest trading relationships in the world.

The ban, which impacts $800 million worth of Canadian alcoholic beverages the US imported last year, marks the latest salvo in a tit-for-tat trading war that already includes sky-high tariffs and a ban on US booze in Ontario and other Canadian provinces.

"This is highly escalatory. The US has sent a very significant shot across the bow to Canada," said Barry Appleton, distinguished adjunct professor of law and co-director of the New York Law School's Center for International Law.

Appleton warned that trade tensions will hurt US companies.

"Brand America is in peril because of the trade war. Canadians are really pissed. That's very hard for American brands," he said.

However, experts say most American shoppers are unlikely to immediately notice the ban, in part because of workarounds, exemptions and the fact that distributors have had time to stock up on imported Canadian alcohol before the ban took effect.

At the same time, with the quickly evolving trade picture with Canada, anything can change on a moment's notice. Hours before the ban took effect, Trump said he is confident the US will come out ahead, and expects Canada to come to the US with a deal soon.

"They want to have a deal with us, they call us all the time. The problem is that they've treated the United States very unfairly," Trump told reporters on Monday.

"Over the next three or four weeks, they're going to come to us and they're going to say, 'We're going to get rid of all the tariffs,'" Trump said. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has not said anything to that effect, however.

The fine print

The US consumer impact will likely be limited by the fine print.

At a high level, the Trump order bans Canadian alcohol imports under a certain size but allows for bulk shipments.

"Bulk booze that is going to be rebottled in the US can cross the border. Labeled booze under a certain size can't," said Appleton.

For instance, whisky and liqueurs, two of Canada's top alcoholic beverage exports to the US, are exempt from the ban when sold in containers larger than four liters. In those cases, they also won't face any tariffs.

But making that switch requires having the right containers on hand or sourcing them from scratch, then rebottling smaller sizes more commonly sold in liquor stores. All that could add to businesses' costs – and potentially get tacked on to the prices consumers pay.

Crown Royal appears to be especially well-positioned since the company already sends bulk shipments of whisky to the United States, where it bottles all products sold domestically.

Bottles of Canadian-made Crown Royal whisky on March 4, 2025. - Christopher Katsarov Luna/Bloomberg/Getty Images

For beer, though, the ban is virtually impossible to get around without an American bottling arm because it covers the bottles, cans and kegs that consumers typically buy. A Canadian business could technically ship beer to the US in a tanker, but that's hardly practical.

That means Americans could have a difficult – if not impossible – time purchasing Moosehead Breweries' beer, since the company's entire brewing and bottling operations take place within Canada.

Ahead of the ban taking effect, Moosehead scrambled to get shipments across the border, a difficult feat as other businesses were racing to do the same, said CEO Andrew Oland. That meant paying rush fees as well as diesel surcharges.

"Misery loves company because we're all paying for this in the brewing industry," he told CNN, adding that tariffs the US and Canada have imposed on aluminum have also driven up the cost of cans.

While only 15% of Moosehead's sales come from the US, the complete loss of that customer base will certainly be felt, he said.

Beyond bulk exemptions, very few alcoholic beverages shipped from Canada were spared.

"Using import bans against an ally is unprecedented and a major deviation from US trade policy," said Inu Manak, a senior fellow focused on trade policy at the Peterson Institute for International Economics. "This is a very symbolic thing to target. It sends a message and is another form of escalation aimed at getting Canadian negotiators back to the table. But Prime Minister Carney is not in a rush to get a deal before the (US) midterms."

Some employees and executives in the alcohol industry expressed dismay about the escalating trade war.

"It's really unfortunate our industry has gotten pulled into this," said Chris Swonger, president and CEO of the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States (DISCUS), an industry trade group. "We American distillers export around the world. We don't want tariffs applied to our products and we don't want tariffs applied to our imports. We like to compete by sip and taste, not tariffs."

Swonger described the ban on US alcohol by some Canadian provinces as an "unforced error" and expressed hope the US ban forces a change in policy.

"We're working hard to get both governments back to the table to get this resolved," he said.

Manak noted that Canadian provinces banned US alcohol only in response to threatened US tariffs.

"In playground parlance, the United Stated started it. That was Canada responding," she said.

And now US officials are responding to that response, demonstrating how an escalatory tit-for-tat cycle gets out of hand.

Cans of beer at a liquor store in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, on July 23, 2026. - James MacDonald/Bloomberg/Getty Images

Confusion on tap

A manager from a Niagara Falls, New York, liquor store located less than five miles away from the Canadian border told CNN he is confused and concerned about the US ban on Canadian alcohol.

"We have a lot of Canadian customers and a lot of Canadian liquor. This is not good for business," said the manager, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. "People have freedom to drink, right?"

An employee at a Port Huron, Michigan, liquor store near the border with Ontario similarly told CNN that many of his customers buy Canadian whisky including Crown Royal, Black Velvet and Rich and Rare.

But the Michigan liquor store employee added that store traffic from Canadians has declined significantly over the past year or so.

"We have a lot fewer Canadian customers than we used to," he said.

To impose the Canadian alcohol ban, Trump is relying on Section 338 of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930, the infamous trade law that exacerbated the Great Depression (and that was hilariously featured in the movie "Ferris Bueller's Day Off").

The law allows the president of the United States to impose tariffs of up to 50% or even ban certain imports when another country discriminates against "commerce of the United States," according to the statute. But because no president before Trump has used the law this way, courts have not weighed in on what the administration must prove to meet its requirements.

In addition to alcohol, Canadian dairy products, such as whey, and motorcycles are also subject to bans, with the Trump administration similarly alleging unfair treatment of American businesses. In total, the bans cover close to $1 billion worth of goods the US imported from Canada last year, according to federal trade data.

The partial Canadian ban on US booze has been painful for the American industry.

Exports of US spirits to Canada plummeted by 70% after Canadian provinces started removing US wine and spirits from store shelves in March 2025, according to DISCUS.

But the Canadian alcohol industry is especially reliant on American consumers.

About 93% of Canadian spirits went to the United States in 2025, according to DISCUS.

"It's going to be absolutely devastating for Canada and Canadian distillers," said Swonger.

From motorcycles to booze, US ban on $1 billion worth of Canadian imports goes into effect

PAUL WISEMAN
Mon, September 28, 2026


WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S.-Canada relations, already tense, are likely to deteriorate further after the United States went ahead early Tuesday with a decision to ban nearly $1 billion worth of Canadian imports, including alcoholic beverages, dairy products and motorcycles.

The ban amounts to barely a ripple in $880 billion worth of annual two-way trade between the two northern neighbors. But it marks another ratcheting up of President Donald Trump's second-term trade war with America's longtime ally and trading partner.

The import ban "certainly won't do anything to help the trade tensions between the United States and Canada,'' said trade attorney Patrick Childress, a partner at Holland & Knight and a former U.S. trade official.

The latest sparring began over the summer when Trump reached back to a Great Depression law to impose 50% tariffs on about $20 billion worth of Canadian imports, charging that Canada discriminates against U.S. dairy, auto and alcoholic beverage producers. Canada promptly counterpunched with tariffs of 15%, 25% or 50%, matching U.S. imports dollar for dollar.

To punish Canada for retaliating against his tariffs, Trump decided to ban a list of Canadian products, effective 12:01 a.m. Eastern time Tuesday.

Economic impact likely to be modest

The economic impact is likely to be minimal. Childress noted that the products on the banned list were already facing Trump's tariffs. "For a lot of these goods, the 50% was already acting as a de facto ban by making importation from Canada into the United States uneconomical,″ he said.

Jacob Jensen, director of trade policy at the center-right American Action Forum think tank, calculates that the ban would cover $967 million worth of Canadian imports, based on 2025 numbers. Of that, 87% would be alcoholic beverages that the U.S. targeted because of some Canadian provinces responding to Trump's provocations by banning U.S. booze from store shelves

Also banned are some dairy products — including the milk byproduct whey. The two countries have long clashed over Canada's attempts to protect its dairy industry from foreign competition by imposing hefty tariffs once dairy imports have exceeded a quota.

The ban also covers motorcycles. Bombardier Recreational Products (BRP) in Quebec confirmed that its three-wheel Can-Am Spyder and Canyon motorcycles "will be excluded from importation into the U.S.'' But BRP said the impact likely won't be felt until next year because it has completed most production and shipments for the current season.

Independent spirit distillers and beer brewers are expected to bear the brunt of the ban more than some well-known Canadian brands that may have workarounds. For example, Crown Royal can ship its whisky in bulk for processing, bypassing the ban. And beer maker Labatt Brewing Co. has some bottling operations in the U.S., exempting some of its beer from the ban.

Diageo, which owns Crown Royal, and Anheuser-Busch InBev, which owns Labatt, did not respond to requests for comments.

A distillery just across the Detroit River in Canada has stopped shipping whiskey to Michigan due to the ongoing tariff war and Trump's ban on Canadian alcohol. "It's really unfortunate," said Danielle Moldovan, director of marketing at the Wolfhead Distillery in Amherstburg, Ontario. "We are a border town. The Americans are great friends of ours, and they visit our distillery on a daily basis."

Moldovan is worried about the long-term impact on Wolfhead's business. Buyers in Georgia were interested in importing the distillery's Coffee Whisky. And its Michigan importer was considering its Vanilla Almond Biscotti and Banana Caramel Vodka. But "those products are going to be put on hold right now until we have further clarification about what's going to happen, how long this ban's going to last," Moldovan said.

"This marks yet another escalation in the trade war that may result in further retaliation on the Canadian side," Jensen said. He expects Canadian exporters and U.S. importers "impacted by these bans will be highly motivated'' to demand that trade officials on both sides find some way to reach a "resolution of this whole ordeal.''
A threat to US goal of a powerful North American trade pact

The impasse imperils efforts to renew the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement, a North American trade pact Trump pressured America's neighbors into accepting in his first term and which he once declared "the most modern, up-to-date, and balanced trade agreement in the history of our country.''

The deal allowed most goods to cross North American borders duty free. But since returning to the White House last year, Trump has announced a series of tariffs that have clouded the future of trade in the region.
Longtime ally Canada moves rapidly to find new trading partners

Trump has directed most of his ire at Canada. He is openly seeking to pull Canadian manufacturing south. And he has inflamed public opinion in Canada by repeatedly suggesting that the country become America's 51st state.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney came to power last year on a promise to stand up to Trump. In addition to retaliating against Trump's tariffs — China is the only other country to do so, with very different results — Carney has sought to reduce Canada's reliance on the United States, which last year accounted for more than 70% of Canadian exports.

"There is now a price to be paid for access to the United States market," Carney said earlier this month. The Canadian prime minister wants to double Canada's non-U.S. trade over the next decade.

Carney has embraced the prospect of Canada becoming the European Union's first associate member.

And he said last week that trade negotiations with India are making "good progress" and that the two countries are aiming to conclude talks by the G20 summit in mid-December.

Carney also broke with the U.S. earlier this year, striking a deal with China to allow a limited number of Chinese electric vehicles into Canada at a sharply reduced tariff in exchange for China lowering tariffs on Canadian canola.

"We take note of the coming into force of the Administration's previously announced trade measures," said Gabriel Brunet, a spokesperson for Canada-U.S. Trade Minister Dominic LeBlanc. "Our first priority remains on protecting and supporting Canadian workers, farmers, families, and businesses from these unjustified actions. Our core focus is on what we can control: building strength at home, diversifying our partnerships abroad, and building Canada strong for all Canadians."

Trump expressed confidence that the Canadians would cave in.

"They're gonna come in and they're gonna say, 'Sir, we are sorry,'" he told reporters Monday. "They've treated the United States very, very badly. I think a deal will be made but it's gonna be fair."

Asked Tuesday about Trump's remarks, Carney declined to respond directly but said Canada remains open to talks.

"Canada stands ready to negotiate in good faith" toward "a mutually advantageous trade arrangement that respects both our countries' sovereignty," Carney said.

Carney also left the door open to further Canadian retaliation over U.S. tariffs and import bans, saying he would "never rule anything out." Asked whether Ottawa might increase trade pressure as the U.S. midterm elections approach, Carney said Canada would not time its response around the American political calendar.

He said Canada could help lower U.S. living costs and argued that energy, food, information and financial security are best served through reliable partnerships.

"Canada is a reliable partner, and we're ready to work in any or all of those areas," Carney said.

Trade attorney Childress said the standoff is likely to continue for months, not weeks. The import bans and the tariffs so far "probably won't cause enough economic upheaval to force either party back to the negotiating table,'' he said.

___

Associated Press writers Mae Anderson in New York, Rob Gillies in Toronto and Mike Householder, reporting from Amherstburg, Ontario, contributed to this story.

 Navarro warns Canada against election interference

Oliver Ward, Daniel Desrochers and Zi-Ann Lum
Tue, September 29, 2026


Navarro warns Canada against election interference


White House trade adviser Peter Navarro warned Canadians not to interfere in U.S. elections, a rhetorical escalation in the ongoing trade war between the two countries.

At an economic event hosted by a communications and policy firm in Washington on Tuesday morning, Navarro told any Canadians in the audience, "Please, if you're on K Street, get the hell out of our country."

"You've lobbied this country and you've been successful in the past and you think you can keep doing that," continued Navarro, who serves as senior counselor for trade and manufacturing in the White House. "Memo to Canada: You cannot do that."

He then warned that Ottawa could face repercussions if Canadians "interfere" in the November elections in the U.S. — specifically singling out Maine and Michigan, both of which have hotly contested Senate and governors races and have been deeply affected by the intensifying trade war President Donald Trump launched against Canada in August.


The comments come the same day Trump's import bans on about $1 billion worth of Canadian exports took effect and on the back of double-digit tariff hikes from both governments after trade talks fell apart last month.

Navarro declined to answer a question from POLITICO on his comment following the event.

Ottawa's "dollar-to-dollar" retaliation for Trump's August tariff increase, which went into effect on Sept. 8, disproportionately hit goods from Michigan, Maine and other U.S. states with competitive elections this fall. When imposing the duties, Canadian Industry Minister Mélanie Joly said they were a "wise and strategic" move to put political pressure on some U.S. elections by targeting specific products. "We think it's the right thing to do right now," she said.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford also ran television ads last year in the U.S. criticizing Trump's tariffs. The nationally televised ad aired during the 2025 World Series between the Toronto Blue Jays and Los Angeles Dodgers and featured former President Ronald Reagan warning of the hurt that tariffs cause the U.S. economy.

The Canadian government did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In Maine, Sen. Susan Collins is trying to fend off a challenge from Democrat Troy Jackson, a former state senator, while Republicans and Democrats are in a neck-and-neck race for the Michigan Senate seat left open by the retiring Democrat Gary Peters. The contests could determine which party controls the Senate in 2027. Both states also have tightly contested House and governors races.

Collins has been openly critical of Trump's tariffs on Canada, saying they will hurt the state's economy and is lobbying the administration to secure tariff relief for specific products. In Michigan, Republican nominee Mike Rogers has hewed closer to the party line, backing Trump's attempts to negotiate with Ottawa, even as the business community in the state has formed an advocacy group to push back against the tariffs.

Michigan's economy is heavily reliant on trade with Canada, especially its auto sector, which is highly integrated across North America. Maine and Canada's agricultural industries — like forestry products — are also heavily linked, as products cross the border between harvest and processing.

Navarro's invocation of election interference ties the trade war to one of Trump's top policy priorities: election security. For months, he's hammered Congress to pass the SAVE America Act, which purports to secure U.S. elections, despite a lack of Republican support for the legislation in the Senate.

Sen. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat and the ranking member of the Finance Committee, said Navarro's comments were part of a "pattern of insults without facts."

"Trump between now and Election Day, he'll be using this for practically everything. If anybody has a sore on their knee, he's going to say it's election interference," Wyden said in an interview at the Capitol.

Navarro is one of the few figures that has remained in Trump's White House across the two administrations, serving as director of the National Trade Council and helming the Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy in Trump's first term, during which he was also among the administration's most vocal critics of Canadian trade practices.

In 2018, he responded to then-Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's pushback on U.S. steel and aluminum tariffs with remarks he eventually walked back.

"There's a special place in hell for any foreign leader that engages in bad-faith diplomacy with President Donald J. Trump and then tries to stab him in the back on the way out the door," he told "Fox News Sunday" in June 2018.

The trade adviser apologized two days later. "My mission was to send a strong signal of strength," he said. "The problem is that in conveying that message I used language that was inappropriate."

 Trump says Canada is ‘one of the worst countries in the entire world’

Tara Suter
Tue, September 29, 2026 

President Trump said Monday that Canada is "one of the worst countries in the entire world" in the wake of heightened tensions between Washington and its historically friendly northern neighbor.

"The problem is that they've treated the United States very unfairly. They have been one of the worst countries in the entire world. You know, we get along with China, we get along with people and we make good deals," the president said in the Oval Office.

"But Canada has been really very difficult to deal with, actually. They've charged our farmers 400 percent tariffs and more. And they take advantage of us," he added.

On Tuesday, Trump's ban on close to $1 billion in Canadian goods went into effect, another strike in a trade war between Washington and Ottawa. It covers Canadian dairy products, motor vehicles and numerous alcoholic beverages.

While signing the executive orders to ban the goods, Trump cited "discrimination" against American equivalents.

There has been an atypical animosity between the U.S. and Canada throughout Trump's second term, not just over trade, but also over the president's push to acquire the U.S.'s northern neighbor. The relationship reached a breaking point after trade negotiations between Washington and Ottawa fell apart in August, and the two countries slapped tariffs on each other's goods.

Earlier this month, Carney said his country had an overreliance on "easy" economic links to the U.S.

"The past 40 years has been a period of deeper economic integration with the United States. Truth is, it was easy business, but it meant we relied too much on one economic partner. It's clear that time is over," Carney said in a video posted to YouTube in early September.

Copyright 2026 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

 Mark Carney's stand against Trump leads to Nobel Peace Prize and Time Person of the Year buzz

ROB GILLIES
Tue, September 29, 2026 
AP


Prime Minister Mark Carney speaks after LNG Canada said it will go ahead with the Phase 2 expansion project at its LNG terminal in Kitimat, B.C., during an announcement in Vancouver, on Tuesday, Sept. 29, 2026. (Darryl Dyck/The Canadian Press via AP) (DARRYL DYCK/The Canadian Press via AP)

TORONTO (AP) — Mark Carney built a global profile in 2026 by standing up to U.S. President Donald Trump. If some prediction-market traders and prominent admirers are right, the Canadian prime minister could end the year with the Nobel Peace Prize and Time magazine's Person of the Year.

Carney briefly became the favorite Monday for the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize on Kalshi, a U.S.-based prediction market, when traders on the exchange put his chances at 14%. His odds later fell, illustrating the highly speculative nature of the wagering.

There is no public evidence Carney is on the Nobel Committee's secret shortlist for the prize that will be announced Oct. 9 in Oslo, Norway.

But the buzz about the Canadian leader possibly winning the esteemed peace prize reflects the message that has raised his profile: Middle powers should band together to defend sovereignty as great powers increasingly use economic and military leverage.

Whether that position resonates with the Nobel Committee is impossible to know. One thing is certain, though: the Nobel and Time's annual award happen to be two honors Trump covets.
Trump believes he deserves Nobel honor

Carney and Trump are locked in an escalating trade war, with 50% U.S. tariffs on billions of dollars of Canadian goods and Canadian retaliation. Trump also has told Canadian leaders to "fall in line" or face consequences "far WORSE" than existing tariffs.

Trump, who has twice been Time's Person of the Year, has repeatedly complained about not receiving the Nobel, saying in July that he "should have won that award more than anybody."

"President Trump would be furious, of course," said Daniel Béland, a political science professor at McGill University in Montreal. "If this ever happens, I would love to be a fly on the wall of the Oval Office to see the president's face when he learns about it."

Trump already possesses a Nobel medal, just not one awarded to him.

Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado, the 2025 Nobel laureate, presented Trump with her medal at the White House in January. Trump accepted it, while the Nobel Committee stressed the prize itself remains hers.

"Trump will be unhappy whoever gets the Nobel," said Nelson Wiseman, professor emeritus at the University of Toronto. "If Carney got it, it would make relations with Canada rockier than they are."

Carney has strong case for Time award

Time already named Carney one of its 100 most influential people of 2026 and specifically noted his popularity increased as he stood up to Trump.

On Tuesday, Carney was the second choice on major prediction markets for Time's Person of the Year, behind New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani. The winner will be announced Dec. 10.

Time has described Trump's cumulative impact as helping create a "new global order" increasingly shaped "not by systems or institutions, but by the will of a single man." Carney's answer has been to urge middle powers to band together rather than bend one by one.

New York University professor Scott Galloway said Carney has it in the bag and called him "the leader that Europe's been looking for for the last 20 years."

"I believe, hands down, Time's Person of the Year has already been decided and it's going to be Mark Carney," Galloway said.

On Galloway's podcast, journalist Fareed Zakaria said Carney is winning admiration abroad and has given countries facing a less predictable United States "a kind of language and a path" to build new alliances rather than simply bend to Washington.
Carney moving to front of a new global order

Carney's standing abroad took off in January at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, where he declared the old international order was not coming back and urged middle powers to work together rather than wait for its restoration. His speech came as European leaders were confronting Trump's push to acquire Greenland and tariff threats.

"We are in the midst of a rupture, not a transition," Carney said in his speech, which received a standing ovation.

Carney has since tried to put the argument for a new global order into practice, pushing Canada closer to Europe and seeking new partners in Asia as Trump's tariffs fractured the old Canada-U.S. relationship.

European lawmakers gave Carney another standing ovation this month as European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen proposed opening the door for Canada to become the European Union's first associate member.

"Carney's international profile has been driven by his standing up to Trump, unlike the Europeans and Asians who rushed to make deals with him," Wiseman said. "Trump's pressure on Canada has helped elevate Carney in the eyes of the world."

Canada could steal the one prize Trump wants most

Rachel Dobkin
Mon, September 28, 2026 

Key takeaways

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney could potentially win the Nobel Peace Prize, leading humanitarian organizations in the odds.


Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney could steal the Nobel Peace Prize from Donald Trump after the president spent the year complaining about not receiving the award.

Trump has repeatedly aired his grievance about the Norwegian Nobel Committee not offering the medal to him, claiming to have helped resolve several world conflicts. Now, with this year's prize announcement less than two weeks away, one of the president's political foes may receive the coveted award.

Carney had a 14 percent chance to take the Nobel Peace Prize on October 9, leading humanitarian organizations Doctors Without Borders and Sudan's Emergency Response Rooms, sports betting information site Covers reported Monday morning, citing data from prediction market Kalshi.

The Canadian leader has pushed back against Trump amid an escalating trade war. Carney said the U.S. tried to restrict his country's ability to make trade deals with other nations during talks last month, which he found to be "unacceptable" and "a question of sovereignty," the Associated Press reported.

Carney got a standing ovation for a speech he gave in January at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in which he rebuked Trump's threats to slap tariffs on imports from European allies until the U.S. reached a deal to acquire Greenland.

"Canada strongly opposes tariffs over Greenland and calls for focused talks to achieve our shared objectives of security and prosperity in the Arctic," Carney said.

He also talked about the "rupture in the world order…where the large, main power, geopolitics, is submitted to no limits, no constraints.

"On the other hand, I would like to tell you that the other countries, especially intermediate powers like Canada, are not powerless. They have the capacity to build a new order that encompasses our values, such as respect for human rights, sustainable development, solidarity, sovereignty and territorial integrity of the various states," Carney said.

Carney had a 14 percent chance of taking the award, leading humanitarian organizations Doctors Without Borders and Sudan's Emergency Response Rooms, according to a Monday morning report, citing data from prediction market Kalshi (AFP via Getty Images)More

Carney's chances of winning the Nobel Peace Prize dropped to 5 percent on Kalshi by Monday evening, falling behind Sudan's Emergency Response Rooms and Doctors Without Borders. But he still led Trump, who had a 2 percent chance of winning the award on Kalshi.

Trump has exaggerated his accomplishments in world peace while starting a war with Iran, saying the Middle Eastern country posed an "imminent" threat to Americans because of its "nuclear ambitions."

"I ended eight wars. Did I get the Nobel Prize? No," Trump said from the Oval Office earlier this month. "Although the person that got it was nice enough that she gave it to me. She said, nobody in the history of the Nobel Prize deserves it more than you. But in Norway, they don't like me because I think they think I'm a little conservative."

Trump was referring to Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado, the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize winner who presented her medal to Trump in January after U.S. forces captured Venezuela's then-President Nicolás Maduro.

Publicly viewable Pentagon data reveals that at least 19 American troops have died in the Iran war, and thousands more Iranians have been killed, according to reports.

During his speech at the United Nations General Assembly in New York last week, Trump threatened to annihilate Iran.

"I have a big decision to make — will a deal be made with Iran that lets them rebuild and create a far greater country than it ever was before…or do I annihilate the Islamic Republic and do it quickly, never giving them a chance to kill and destroy people and countries again?" Trump asked.

While Trump wages war with a Middle East adversary, he is also picking a fight with America's northern ally. The president has pushed for Canada to become the 51st state and called Carney the "future governor of Canada." He also signed an executive order last month to change the name of Lake Ontario to "Lake America."

After trade talks failed, Trump imposed a 50 percent tariff on about $20 billion of Canadian imports last month, according to the AP. Canadian officials then announced "dollar-for-dollar" tariffs on American goods, including steel, electronics and dairy, that began earlier this month. Trump's administration then banned some Canadian dairy products, motorcycles, and most alcoholic beverages, which Carney said were "relatively modest measures" compared to other U.S. actions, according to another AP report.

Carney has signaled that he will continue to work with Trump on other international issues, saying, "We continue to have to work with the United States. We can compartmentalize across this."

Carney accuses US steelmaker of betraying Canadian workers after layoffs tied to Trump tariffs

ROB GILLIES
Updated Tue, September 29, 2026

AP


Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney speaks after LNG Canada said it will go ahead with the Phase 2 expansion project at its LNG terminal in Kitimat, British Columbia, during an announcement in Vancouver, Tuesday, Sept. 29, 2026. (Darryl Dyck/The Canadian Press via AP) (Darryl Dyck/The Canadian Press via AP)


TORONTO (AP) — Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney accused the U.S. owner of steelmaker Stelco, a subsidiary of Cleveland-Cliffs, of betraying Canadian workers Tuesday after it announced layoffs it attributed in part to U.S. President Donald Trump's tariffs — tariffs Cleveland-Cliffs' chief executive has publicly championed.

Carney singled out Cleveland-Cliffs CEO Lourenco Goncalves, noting that he had applauded Trump's steel tariffs. Goncalves has called the 50% tariffs "a necessary step" to protect U.S. steelmakers.

"Our thoughts are with the workers and the families who have been betrayed by the company," Carney said.

Carney also threatened legal action against Cleveland-Cliffs, saying the Ohio-based company has binding employment obligations stemming from its C$3.4 billion ($2.4 billion) takeover of Stelco in 2024.

Stelco said up to 500 workers could be affected as it indefinitely idles cold-rolled and coated operations at its Hamilton, Ontario, plant and shifts production to its Lake Erie facility in Nanticoke, Ontario.

Cleveland-Cliffs said Monday the move does not shift steel production out of Canada: Output will be concentrated at Stelco's Lake Erie Works in Nanticoke, Ontario, where it expects a significant number of affected Hamilton workers to be absorbed, with overall steel tonnage unchanged.

In a memo to employees, Stelco said U.S. tariffs had "significantly shrunk the market" for its cold-rolled and galvanized products. The company said demand in markets it traditionally serves fell almost 25% in the second quarter compared to the 2024 quarterly average, including a 10% decline in Canada.

The layoffs come amid an escalating Canada-U.S. trade war in which Trump has imposed 50% tariffs on Canadian steel and other goods and Canada has retaliated with tariffs of its own. At a White House event Monday announcing a new $15 billion steel plant in Iowa, Trump credited his tariffs with reducing foreign steel imports and attracting investment to the United States, saying companies were building plants there "because they don't want to pay tariffs."

Carney said the federal government had offered financial assistance to preserve jobs but did not disclose the amount or terms.

"There's money on the table from the federal government," Carney said. "The company made representations and has legal obligations for employment. We intend to use all powers that we have and pursue them to the fullest extent of the law."

The Canadian government approved Cleveland-Cliffs' takeover of Stelco in October 2024 on the condition that it meet legally binding five-year employment commitments, including maintaining at least the same number of unionized workers and the vast majority of nonunion employees.

Cleveland-Cliffs did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Carney's remarks.

Hamilton steel plant to lay off hundreds of workers as U.S. tariffs prompt 'survival' move

CBC
Mon, September 28, 2026

Stelco Hamilton Works production facility is seen in September 2024. Stelco said it will indefinitely idle its cold-rolled and coated operations at its Hamilton Works plant on Monday. (Patrick Morrell/CBC - image credit)


Stelco Holdings Inc. said on Monday that it plans to idle part of its Hamilton plant in order to "ensure the survival" of the company, as U.S. tariffs squeeze its sales.

Stelco said the decision will impact up to 500 employees.

In a memo obtained by CBC News on Monday, the company said it will indefinitely idle its cold-rolled and coated operations at its Hamilton Works plant, with operations set to begin winding down on Oct. 9.

Ron Wells, president of United Steelworkers Local 1005, estimates 350 steelworkers will be laid off. He says he was briefed on the situation in a meeting with the company on Monday morning.

"Obviously, we got to meet with the company, and find out who's getting laid off, [and] make sure it's done by seniority," Wells told CBC News on Monday. "Christmas ain't that far away, and we have no idea the duration of these layoffs … People are concerned. I don't blame them."

The company said this will not impact its ability to supply hot-rolled steel products.

"This is an unfortunate but necessary action to help ensure the survival of Stelco in what has become a challenging and unsustainable market for cold-rolled and coated products caused by the ongoing and sustained trade disruptions impacting the Canadian steel industry," Stelco vice-president of sales Frederic Fafard stated in the memo.

An aerial photo of the Stelco Hamilton steel production facility. (Patrick Morrell/CBC)

U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order in June applying up to 50 per cent tariffs to certain steel and aluminum imports from Canada.

"Stelco's market for cold-rolled and galvanized products has contracted significantly, while import penetration for these products remains at heightened levels," Fafard said in the memo.

"While the measures taken by the federal government in Canada have served to reduce imports into Canada overall, import volumes remain at levels that prevent Stelco from being able to bridge the gap in the market created by the trade crisis."

Ohio-based Cleveland-Cliffs acquired Hamilton-based Stelco in a $3.4-billion Cdn cash-and-stock deal that closed in November 2024. In a news release announcing the deal, Stelco's then-CEO Alan Kestenbaum stated the transaction "keeps national interests at the forefront and recognizes the importance of the workforce."

"We're very disappointed," Wells said. "In particular, when Cliffs bought us in the fall of 2024, they made commitments. One of those commitments was to maintain the same number of unionized employees."

In an email to CBC News on Monday, a Cleveland-Cliffs spokesperson confirmed Joly has been in touch with chairman and CEO Lourenco Goncalves.

"Both Cliffs and the Canadian government have the interests of the Stelco workers in mind, and will continue to work together to minimize the impact of the current market situation on Canadian workers," wrote Pat Persico, the company's senior director of corporate communications.

She said that while Stelco is idling some of its operations in Hamilton, the company's total output of steel will not be impacted as it consolidates production at its Lake Erie Works.

"Very importantly, job opportunities at Lake Erie Works will be offered to Hamilton employees," Persico wrote in a previous email.

"We expect that a significant number of employees affected by the indefinite idle at Hamilton should be absorbed at Lake Erie Works."

Wells told CBC News on Tuesday that his union was informed that 46 positions would be offered.

Industry Minister 'extremely disappointed'

In a statement on Monday, Industry Minister Mélanie Joly slammed the decision to lay off workers, while noting Ottawa had offered to help Stelco weather the impact of U.S. tariffs.

"Our government has made clear to the company that we are ready and willing to provide financial support to sustain operations and protect jobs. Its decision to reject these practical proposals and continue with layoffs is extremely disappointing," she said.

"Stelco and Cleveland-Cliffs have made significant commitments to Canadian steelworkers. We will use every lever possible to defend Canadian industry, protect jobs, and secure our supply chain."

Trump announces new steel plant in Iowa

On Monday, U.S. President Trump touted a new $15-billion US investment plan by Minnesota-based steelmaker Mesabi Metallics as evidence that American tariffs on imported steel are working as his administration intended.

The company announced plans to build a massive plant in Iowa, with production set to begin in 2030.

"I imposed powerful 50 per cent tariffs on all foreign steel, and now our steel industry is roaring back to life." Trump said at a news announcement in the Oval Office. "Everyone is building their plant here because they don't want to pay tariffs. It's really not that complicated."

The move is raising concerns north of the border, where Kevon Stewart, director of United Steelworkers District 6, said his phone has been lighting up with calls from distressed Canadian workers.

"Everything is timing right now," he told CBC News on Monday.

"This is not only a wake-up call, because the call for action has been there before. But we've got to come up with a game plan that ensures workers are protected if and when these measures are implemented."

He said such protections could include increased benefits, or removing the waiting time for benefits.

Colin Mang, an economist at McMaster University in Hamilton, said the layoffs announced Monday are "a consequence of our trade war with the United States." For Stelco, he said the situation is worsened by a steady flow of foreign products coming into Canada.

"The lack of access to the American market has meant that we have a surplus of steel production capacity here in Canada, and there just isn't enough domestic Canadian demand in order to absorb all of the output from the steelmakers here," Mang told CBC News.

"The Canadian government has worked to restrict the amount of steel coming into Canada, but when you look at a variety of steel products, particularly the kinds of flat products that Stelco manufactures, Canada has imported about 1.2 million tons from other trading partners around the world. That's because we continue to have free trade agreements with a variety of countries. So, it's very difficult to restrict imports from our other trading partners."

Blair Dickerson, president of the Canadian Steel Producers Association, said his thoughts are with the workers impacted by Monday's announcement. He also called upon Canada's federal government and the Trump to resolve their ongoing trade tension.

"Days like today demonstrate how challenging the tariff situation is, and provide a stark reminder as to the urgency of finding a solution," Dickerson said in an email.

"Recognizing the Government's support to date, Canada must continue and deepen the work of keeping unfairly traded steel out of our market, enforcing our measures at the border, and ensuring our producers can be competitive here at home."

Hamilton Mayor Andrea Horwath said she plans to fight to ensure Stelco and Cleveland-Cliffs live up to the commitments their executives made to workers in her city.

"The fight is not over," she told the CBC's As It Happens radio program on Monday

"This particular company has been very clear ... that they support Donald Trump and his tariffs, and desire to pull all steelmaking back into the United States.

Wells, president of United Steelworkers Local 1005, said it's ironic for a company's whose leadership supports Trump to criticize U.S. tariffs for eroding its business.

"The CEO, Lourenco Goncalves, he's the biggest supporter of Trump and his tariffs. So, it's tough to have any sympathy when you know they're the basically the master of this disaster."

Cleveland-Cliffs slides as report shows Stelco idling plant over US tariffs

Luke Juricic
Mon, September 28, 2026 


Investing.com -- Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. shares tumbled nearly 8% in late Monday trading following reports that its Canadian subsidiary, Stelco Holdings Inc., plans to halt operations at a key Ontario processing facility. The decline reflects growing market concern over the compounding toll of trade frictions on North American steel supply chains.

According to a letter to customers obtained by Bloomberg News, Stelco expects to indefinitely idle its cold-rolled and coated operations at Hamilton Works in the coming weeks. The move highlights the acute pressures facing Canadian steelmakers as elevated U.S. import tariffs continue to disrupt regional trade flows and contract domestic demand for downstream products.

The operational curtailment marks a significant setback for the Canadian steel sector, which has struggled to adjust since the U.S. maintained a 50% tariff under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act. While Ottawa implemented countermeasures to curb foreign imports, Stelco noted that those actions proved insufficient to offset the market contraction triggered by restricted access to the U.S. market.

To mitigate the fallout, Cleveland-Cliffs is restructuring its operational footprint by shifting primary manufacturing focus to its more integrated Lake Erie Works facility in Nanticoke, Ontario. In an emailed statement sent to Bloomberg, Cliffs spokesperson Patricia Persico emphasized that total steel output will remain unchanged, though the product mix will pivot toward a higher concentration of hot-rolled coil.

The wind-down at the Hamilton facility is scheduled to begin on Oct. 9 and is expected to result in approximately 350 job cuts, according to local reporting from the Hamilton Spectator. Because Hamilton Works functions primarily as a downstream finishing plant, concentrating upstream production at Lake Erie Works allows the parent company to preserve overall tonnage while curtailing higher-cost processing lines.

Stelco assured clients that it will honor existing customer orders during the transition while maintaining full capacity for hot-rolled steel deliveries. Investors, however, appear focused on broader margin compression, watching closely to see whether Cleveland-Cliffs can successfully absorb trade-driven demand shifts without sacrificing profitability across its expanded North American network.

Why Cleveland-Cliffs (CLF) Dipped More Than Broader Market Today

Zacks Equity Research
Mon, September 28, 2026


Cleveland-Cliffs (CLF) ended the recent trading session at $11.22, demonstrating a -7.88% change from the preceding day's closing price. This change lagged the S&P 500's 0.77% loss on the day. Elsewhere, the Dow lost 0.67%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq lost 0.92%.

Shares of the mining company witnessed a gain of 4.82% over the previous month, beating the performance of the Basic Materials sector with its loss of 9.1%, and the S&P 500's gain of 0.96%.


Market participants will be closely following the financial results of Cleveland-Cliffs in its upcoming release. In that report, analysts expect Cleveland-Cliffs to post earnings of $0.24 per share. This would mark year-over-year growth of 153.33%. In the meantime, our current consensus estimate forecasts the revenue to be $5.6 billion, indicating a 18.25% growth compared to the corresponding quarter of the prior year.

Regarding the entire year, the Zacks Consensus Estimates forecast earnings of -$0.04 per share and revenue of $21.1 billion, indicating changes of +98.39% and +13.4%, respectively, compared to the previous year.

Investors should also note any recent changes to analyst estimates for Cleveland-Cliffs. Recent revisions tend to reflect the latest near-term business trends. Hence, positive alterations in estimates signify analyst optimism regarding the business and profitability.

Empirical research indicates that these revisions in estimates have a direct correlation with impending stock price performance. To exploit this, we've formed the Zacks Rank, a quantitative model that includes these estimate changes and presents a viable rating system.

The Zacks Rank system, which ranges from #1 (Strong Buy) to #5 (Strong Sell), has an impressive outside-audited track record of outperformance, with #1 stocks generating an average annual return of +25% since 1988. Over the last 30 days, the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate has witnessed a 7.69% increase. As of now, Cleveland-Cliffs holds a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold).

The Steel - Producers industry is part of the Basic Materials sector. With its current Zacks Industry Rank of 68, this industry ranks in the top 28% of all industries, numbering over 250.

The Zacks Industry Rank gauges the strength of our industry groups by measuring the average Zacks Rank of the individual stocks within the groups. Our research shows that the top 50% rated industries outperform the bottom half by a factor of 2 to 1.

Trump unveils plans to build $15B steel mill in Iowa

U.S. President Donald Trump answers questions from reporters during an announcement in the Oval Office at the White House on Sept. 28, 2026 in Washington, DC. He shared plans to build a $15 billion steel plant spearheaded by Mesabi Metallics. · Manufacturing Dive · Kevin Dietsch via Getty Images

Nathan Owens
Tue, September 29, 2026 
 Manufacturing Dive. 

Dive Brief:

President Donald Trump on Monday announced a Minnesota steelmaker's plans to invest $15 billion in Iowa to build what would become the largest U.S. steel mill.


The Mesabi Metallics-led project will create 1,750 jobs and add 10 million tons of annual steel production capacity, Trump said at the Oval Office. It is also expected to generate $95 billion for the U.S. economy during construction and the first 10 years of operations.


The company, which is backed by India-based conglomerate Essar Group, recently opened an iron ore mine in Minnesota that will supply pellets to the Iowa mill once completed. Steel production is set to begin in 2030, Trump said. Federal and state funding details have yet to be disclosed.


Dive Insight:

The Trump administration has made domestic metals production a top priority, citing national security and military supply concerns amid a war with Iran.

At the same time, Trump's tariff strategy has cut imports of foreign steel and raised U.S. steel prices. He doubled the Section 232 rate on metal imports to 50% last summer and has since made adjustments to close loopholes and allow exemptions for certain products.

On the other hand, higher raw material costs are squeezing manufacturers and resulting in higher prices for consumers. Higher tariffs also helped the United States surpass Japan last year as a crude steel producer for the first time since 1999.

"Our steel industry is roaring back to life," Trump said Monday. "Everyone's building their plant here because they don't want to pay tariffs."

Mesabi Metallics plans to use electric arc furnace technology along with recycled scrap and direct-reduced iron mined from Minnesota to produce U.S. steel in Iowa, according to its news release. It is the company's first steel mill project and billed as the largest in U.S. history. The project is also expected to create 6,000 construction jobs.


In addition to the $15 billion investment, Mesabi Metallics has agreed to spend an additional $3 billion to complete its iron ore mine in Nashwauk, Minnesota. More than 1,500 construction workers are already on site there, along with 200 employees, with the goal of upstarting operations to make what the company is calling Patriot Pellets.

"This is a major moment for U.S. made steel," Mesabi Metallics CEO Joe Broking said in a statement.

Federal and state funding details were limited at the White House. Trump said "we're doing very little" from the public sector. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick added that the "deal is done" and is being funded by private money. Whether the project was approved for any state incentives is unclear.


The Iowa mill is one of several projects supported by Trump to bolster domestic metals production. Last year, Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry joined the president at the White House to announce Hyundai Steel Company's $5.8 billion steel mill plans. Trump also expressed strong support for a $4 billion aluminum smelter coming to Oklahoma that is led by Emirates Global Aluminum and Century Aluminum.


Both projects have received strong pushback from local residents and advocacy groups who raised environmental and nuisance concerns.

Hyundai Steel held a groundbreaking for its Louisiana mill on Sept. 4. The aluminum smelter has been delayed until April 2027 after Inola's town council voted to extend its initial 60-day pause, the Oklahoma Voice reported. The project's developer followed up the decision with an economic impact study, highlighting the job creation and money generation opportunities.

"We're doing a tremendous aluminum plant in Oklahoma, one of my favorite places in the whole world," Trump said. "That's going to be unbelieveable."

Recommended Reading

Hyundai Steel project moves ahead despite local pushback

Mesabi plans $18bn investment to combine iron ore mine and steel complex

Mesabi announced the project during an event at the White House. 

Credit: Mesabi Metallics. 

Shree Mishra
Tue, September 29, 2026 

Essar Group-backed Mesabi Metallics has announced a $18bn investment to establish a fully integrated steel operation, combining its iron ore mine on the Mesabi Iron Range in Minnesota with a proposed steel-making complex in Iowa, US.

The company revealed details of the project during an event at the White House.

Of the total, $3bn is earmarked for completing the iron ore mine in Nashwauk, while $15bn is allocated to the development of the new Iowa steel complex.

The project aims to create more than 8,000 jobs, including in excess of 6,000 construction roles for the Iowa complex and 1,750 permanent positions at full operation.

More than 1,500 construction workers and 200 full-time employees are currently on-site in Nashwauk, with plans to reach 350 permanent roles once the mine becomes fully operational.

Mesabi CEO Joe Broking said: "This is a major moment for US-made steel, combining the highest quality direct-reduction grade iron ore pellet from Minnesota's Iron Range with the most advanced DRI [direct reduced iron] to EAF [electric arc furnace] steel-making technology in Iowa to supply the high-quality, all-American steel that our national defence, cars and trucks, shipbuilding, household appliances, energy and infrastructure depend on."

The Nashwauk operation, situated on the Mesabi Iron Range, is said to be the first new iron ore mine constructed in the US in 50 years.


Iron ore sourced from the Minnesota site will be used to manufacture direct-reduction-grade iron ore pellets, called 'Patriot Pellets', intended for use in the Iowa steel facility's production process.

At the Iowa complex, EAFs will be fed with a combination of hot, freshly reduced iron from the plant's own direct-reduction process and scrap steel.

By using iron ore that has had its oxygen removed at temperatures below melting point and feeding the resulting metallic iron into the furnaces while still hot, the process is designed to cut energy consumption and lower emissions compared with conventional blast furnace methods.

The company estimated that over the construction period and the first ten years of full operations, the investment would produce $95bn in total economic output across the region.

According to Mesabi, this integrated approach aims to develop a fully domestic steel supply chain, with all major production steps based in the US.

In April 2026, Mesabi obtained $150m in funding from the Macquarie Group for its iron ore mine and pellet plant in the US.

A $15 Billion Iowa Steel Mill Is Coming. What It Means for Nucor and Cleveland-Cliffs

Omor Ibne Ehsan
Tue, September 29, 2026 

Key takeaways

The White House announced the construction of a $15 billion steel mill in Iowa by Mesabi Metallics, which will start production at 7.5 million tons a year and rise to about 10 million tons by 2030.

Quick Read

The $15B Iowa mill mirrors NUE's electric arc furnace model, pressuring CLF's higher-cost integrated operations when first steel arrives in 2030.


CLF dropped nearly 8% after Stelco indefinitely idled Canadian operations, showing how tariffs that prop up U.S. prices simultaneously shrank Cliffs abroad.


On Monday, September 28, 2026, The White House announced that Mesabi Metallics will build a $15 billion steel mill in Iowa, starting at 7.5 million tons a year and rising to about 10 million tons. Mesabi is privately held and foreign-owned, so you cannot buy shares in it.

andresr / Getty Images

For Nucor (NYSE:NUE) and Cleveland-Cliffs (NYSE:CLF), the plant pressures price. First steel is expected in 2030, making this a valuation question today and an earnings question later, according to Mining.com.
Iowa Will Use the Electric Furnace Route Nucor Already Runs

The mill will convert iron ore into direct reduced iron and melt it in electric arc furnaces. Nucor already runs electric arc furnaces, while Cleveland-Cliffs operates traditional integrated operations that management describes as "miners, pellet producers, iron makers, steel makers, and downstream manufacturers."

The planned output is at about one-tenth of last year's U.S. steel production. The Export-Import Bank of the United States announced a $770 million direct loan for the associated Minnesota iron ore mine, and administration officials tied the project to steel tariffs.

Cleveland-Cliffs already dropped 7.84% on September 28 after its Canadian unit, Stelco, reported plans to indefinitely idle cold-rolled and coated operations at Hamilton Works, affecting about 350 jobs. Stelco blamed the 50% U.S. tariff on Canadian steel.

Tariffs cut both ways. The regime propping up U.S. prices shrank Cliffs in Canada. Nucor fell 1.1% that day, a decline likely tied to the Iowa project.

Nucor Stays Profitable While Cliffs Is Still Rebuilding

Nucor reported second-quarter adjusted EPS of $4.84 on $10.4 billion in sales. Its weak spot is expectations: on September 17, Nucor guided third-quarter EPS to $5.55 to $5.65, missing the $6.20 consensus, and shares fell about 5.8% the next day.

NUE Earnings Explorer — 24/7 Wall St.

Cleveland-Cliffs lost $0.25 a share in the second quarter after a full-year 2025 loss of $1.4 billion. Cleveland-Cliffs guided third-quarter adjusted EBITDA to about $575 million from $286 million, suggesting a floor is forming, although $7.7 billion of long-term debt leaves little room for a price war when the first-steel date arrives around 2030.


CLF Earnings Explorer — 24/7 Wall St.



Lens

Nucor

Cleveland-Cliffs

Steelmaking process

Electric arc furnaces

Integrated blast furnaces


Q2 per-share result

$4.84 adjusted EPS, according to Nucor

$0.25 loss


Year-to-date stock move

50.77%

-15.51%


Nucor screens better than Cleveland-Cliffs on this setup: Iowa mirrors Nucor's electric-furnace model, while integrated producers carry higher fixed costs. Nucor has gained 50.77% this year yet trades near 11 times forward earnings, with $244.52 under the average analyst target of $283.63.

NUE Price Target — 24/7 Wall St.

Cliffs, at $11.23 and down 43.67% over five years, needs contract resets and debt paydown before Iowa's output arrives. If management hits its leverage target of under 2.5x debt to EBITDA by mid-2027, or Nucor misses guidance, reconsider the ranking. I'd tag NUE stock a buy, and I'd avoid CLF stock for now.

CLF Price Target — 24/7 Wall St.

Nucor (NUE) Moves To Join FERC Fight Over MISO Power Rules

Bailey Pemberton
Tue, September 29, 2026 



NUE-0.82%

STLD+0.11%


Nucor (NYSE:NUE) and Steel Dynamics jointly filed a motion to intervene with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission on the MISO footprint.

The filing signals both steel producers are seeking a formal voice in how electricity market rules apply within the MISO region.

The move focuses attention on power market design for large industrial users that rely heavily on MISO for long term electricity needs.

This joint FERC intervention on the MISO footprint sits against broader energy market pressures our research has been tracking for Nucor. We have also flagged 1 warning sign for Nucor.

NYSE:NUE Earnings & Revenue Growth as at Sep 2026

Nucor is a US-based steel producer in the Metals and Mining industry with a market value of about $56.1b, so electricity rules inside the MISO footprint directly affect how its mills power energy-intensive steelmaking operations. The motion with regulators ties into core manufacturing costs for the business rather than a side issue.

Why Nucor wants a direct say in its power costs

For Nucor, stepping into the MISO rulemaking process lines up with the earnings story that now leans heavily on new mills and downstream assets turning into steady cash generators. Power pricing and reliability feed directly into whether those projects support the kind of margin profile analysts are watching in the multi year US$15b to US$20b capital program. This move also fits with the broader theme of Nucor working on inputs it can influence, rather than just accepting pass through energy costs as a fixed constraint.

See how these catalysts shape Nucor's path to a $284 fair value.

The practical checkpoint is what comes out of this specific FERC proceeding. Investors can watch for the next formal MISO or FERC filing that references Nucor or Steel Dynamics as intervenors, and any decision that lays out new tariff structures or market rules for large industrial users inside the MISO footprint.

One piece of the Nucor puzzle this article has not opened yet

Power contracts and mill projects only tell part of the story. Who actually calls the shots at Nucor, and what they are rewarded for delivering, can reshape how you read everything else. 

See who is actually steering Nucor, and how they are paid.

Google Earth reveals mysterious giant stone circles in the Andes

Techlicious
Updated Mon, September 28, 2026 



Key takeaways

A mountaineer discovered a unique complex of stone circles in Argentina's Andes, suspected to be a geoglyph, with no known parallels in the region.


A mountaineer combing through Google Earth has located a previously unknown complex of enormous stone circles more than 3,000 meters (about 9,800 feet) up in Argentina's Andes, and the archaeologists now studying it say they know of nothing like it in the region. The team suspects it is a geoglyph, a large design built or carved into the ground that is best appreciated from the air.

Mendoza climber Carlos Gobbi, who had spent nearly 30 years searching the mountains for archaeological sites, spotted the formations in satellite imagery in May 2025, according to Los Andes. The site sits in the Cordillera del Tigre, a mountain range that runs roughly 100 kilometers (62 miles) north to south through the Andes of Mendoza and San Juan provinces. Reaching the remote location – with no nearby water sources – took three tries. Attempts in September and November 2025 fell short. On February 14, 2026, Gobbi and his companions finally arrived after a trek of almost four days. Gobbi recalls that seeing the site in person was "really striking."

On the ground, the group found stone walls forming corridors, along with trenches filled or lined with rock. From above, satellite images show large circular structures linked by passageways, plus rectangular areas, joined as a single figure. The circles measure 27 to 35 meters (roughly 89 to 115 feet) across.

The obvious comparison is Peru's Nazca Lines, but Horacio Chiavazza, an archaeologist at Argentina's National University of Cuyo who co-directs the ArqueoAndes research project studying the site, sees no parallel in design or construction. The Nazca figures were made by cutting trenches into the desert floor, while this site was built by piling stones on top of the ground. Geoglyphs also exist in northern Chile, Chiavazza said, but they come from different eras and cultures and may have served different purposes. He added that the team cannot yet say the Mendoza site depicts any particular figure.

Nobody knows how old the complex is, who built it, or why. Researchers found no pottery, food remains, or other surface evidence of people living there, which points away from a settlement. Combined with the extreme location, that has led the team to consider a ritual or symbolic purpose, possibly from the Inca period (the empire the Incas called Tahuantinsuyo) or earlier. If it is Inca, Chiavazza said, it would be one of the southernmost geoglyphs of that empire and could be tied to the Tambo de Ranchillos, an Inca waystation in the Uspallata Valley.

Those ideas remain hypotheses until the fieldwork, which starts in December, is complete. Chiavazza and Cristina Prieto-Olavarría, an archaeologist with Argentina's national research council CONICET who co-directs ArqueoAndes, will climb to the site with Gobbi as guide, joined by colleagues from Spain's University of Jaén. The team has permits from Mendoza's provincial heritage directorate and plans detailed mapping, drone surveys, remote sensing, and geochemical work, along with sediment excavation to help date the structures. The Spanish specialists will examine sediments and plant remains at microscopic scale to reconstruct the climate, water supply, and human activity around the site. The researchers also plan to involve Indigenous communities from Uspallata in the interpretation.

DNA evidence from Thomas Jefferson’s hair reveals the truth about his relationship with Sally Hemings

Mindy Weisberger, CNN
Tue, September 29, 2026 


Thomas Jefferson has long been rumored to have fathered children with Sally Hemings. New genetic evidence strengthens that connection. (Photo by Burstein Collection/Corbis/VCG via Getty Images) - Burstein Collection/Corbis/Getty ImagesMore

Opening a Bible that once belonged to Thomas Jefferson, staff at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History in 2011 discovered a reddish-blond hair pressed between the pages. That hair, suspected to have belonged to Jefferson himself, launched a DNA investigation spanning more than a decade that's now providing a long-missing puzzle piece regarding Jefferson's relationship with Sally Hemings, an enslaved woman in his household.

After spending years reconstructing DNA fragments, scientists have revealed the most compelling evidence to date that Jefferson, a founding father of the United States, also fathered children with Hemings — a relationship that has been long rumored but never definitively proven. How that investigation unfolded is documented in the book "History by a Hair: Thomas Jefferson, Sally Hemings & Solving a 200-Year-Old Mystery," written by Richard Kurin, a distinguished scholar and ambassador-at-large at the Smithsonian, and published on September 22.

Kurin is also senior author of a paper describing the methods that connected the former US president to Hemings' descendants, which involved delving deep into the genetics of the Jefferson and Hemings family trees. The paper, published September 21 on the preprint platform bioRXiv, has not yet been peer-reviewed.

Richard Kurin, author of the recent book and paper about the genetic connections between Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings, examines collection items. - Danielle Kurin

In addition to testing the hair found in the Bible, the researchers also collected genetic material from multiple confirmed samples of Jefferson's hair, held in the collection of the Smithsonian. They compared that with DNA from descendants of multiple lineages: Jefferson and his wife Martha, Jefferson's brother Randolph, and two of Hemings' sons, Eston and Madison. (Hemings had four children who lived to adulthood, but only Eston and Madison claimed Jefferson as their father).

Matches in the DNA suggest the chance that Thomas Jefferson fathered at least one of Sally Hemings' children was 99.96%.

Previously, a genetic study from 1998 led by the late Eugene Foster, a retired pathology professor at Tufts University and the University of Virginia, claimed to prove Jefferson's parentage of Hemings' children. That study found a rare haplotype — a combination of genes — in the Y chromosomes of males descended from Thomas Jefferson's uncle. That same haplotype existed in descendants of Hemings, too. However, many experts questioned Foster's claim for one very important reason, Kurin told CNN.

"He didn't have Thomas Jefferson's DNA," Kurin said. "He didn't have something to directly compare living descendants of the Jefferson family to Madison Hemings and Eston Hemings and others that might have been the descendants of Thomas Jefferson." Critics of that the 1998 study said Foster's evidence merely connected Hemings' descendants to a male in the Jefferson lineage, and not necessarily to the former president.

"I thought, if we can get Thomas Jefferson's DNA, we could use that as the source of comparison to various descendants, and really firmly solve the question," Kurin said.
A 'dead end' hair

Kurin and his team were initially disappointed to find that the Bible hair wasn't the smoking gun that they thought it would be. To check whether the hair was Jefferson's, they compared its DNA with that of a living woman who was a direct descendant of Thomas Jefferson's mother along the family's female lineage. They expected to find identical mitochondrial DNA, which is genetic material specifically inherited from the maternal side.

But their hopes were dashed when the two samples didn't match.

Still, they were able to access other hair samples that records attributed to Thomas Jefferson. These hairs, including a lock clipped at his deathbed, were in a packet provided by the Thomas Jefferson Foundation at Monticello, and had not previously been available for analysis. The scientists reconstructed and compared historic genome sequences of Jefferson and Hemings with DNA collected from 16 living individuals, including multiple descendants of Eston and Madison Hemings. These analyses found matches across genomes that linked Hemings descendants to Thomas Jefferson.

"What made this study so powerful is that researchers weren't just comparing two genomes," said Éadaoin Harney, a senior population geneticist at the 23andMe Research Institute. "Instead, they collected DNA samples from multiple people from different branches of the family tree."

A lock of hair taken from Thomas Jefferson on the day of his death on July 4, 1826. This sample was used in additional DNA analysis. - Ian Aktins/Thomas Jefferson Foundation at Monticello

In genetic analysis, larger sample pools provide more robust conclusions, said Harney, who was not involved in the new research. "By studying the patterns of DNA sharing across all of these individuals, it became possible to disambiguate exactly how the descendants of Sally Hemings were related to Thomas Jefferson," she told CNN in an email.

While the new book and paper focus on genomic data of well-known historical figures, these methods are also broadly useful for illuminating the obscured history of enslaved people, which has been a focus of Harney's own research. In a 2023 study of enslaved and free African Americans from Maryland, Harney used DNA analysis combined with other biomolecular and archaeological techniques to uncover individuals' ancestry and places of origin. The data also suggested links to people who still live in Maryland.



"Historical records are full of gaps, particularly when it comes to documenting the lives of people who occupied less privileged places in society," she said. "This is particularly true for enslaved Africans and African Americans, who are often only described in historical records as property."

Genetic analyses, such as those used in the new Jefferson study, can help restore connections that were lost because of slavery, Harney added. "The same tools can be applied to study the many enslaved people whose lives were never well documented, and help reconnect them with their descendants."
From rumor to confirmation

Whispers about Jefferson's sexual relationship with Hemings — who was 30 years his junior and a half-sister to his wife — have endured for more than 200 years. Initial rumors were fueled by local innuendo and supported by records aligning Hemings' pregnancies with Jefferson's presence at his plantation home of Monticello in Virginia. An article published in 1902 in the Richmond Recorder stated that "there is not an individual in the neighbourhood of Charlottesville who does not believe the story," regarding Jefferson fathering children with Hemings.

Though the conclusions of Foster's 1998 study were not universally accepted, that genetic evidence was compelling enough for the Thomas Jefferson Foundation to issue a statement two years later acknowledging "the strong likelihood that Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings had a relationship over time that led to the birth of one, and perhaps all, of the known children of Sally Hemings."

Finally laying that uncertainty to rest was enough of a motivation to keep Kurin and the other researchers going for more than a decade, despite their initial disappointment that the hair found in the Bible did not belong to Thomas Jefferson, he said.

"We had hit a dead end, but scientists are always looking for alternatives," he said. "I think we were propelled still by scientific and historical curiosity."

While the question of Jefferson's ancestry in Hemings' descendants may finally have been answered, another remains: Whose hair was pressed in Jefferson's bible? The researchers had collected enough of its fragmentary genetic data to know that it belonged to a female member of the Jefferson family, but that was all the information the team could learn, Kurin said.

"It's like a partial fingerprint," he explained. "That is still a lingering mystery."

Mindy Weisberger is a science writer and media producer whose work has appeared in Live Science, Scientific American and How It Works magazine. She is the author of "Rise of the Zombie Bugs: The Surprising Science of Parasitic Mind-Control" (Hopkins Press).

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