$15bn Iowa Steel Mill Promise Meets Skepticism in Wever

A $15bn promise to build the largest steel mill in the country has so far produced no shovels, no workers and no land deals in the rural Iowa region where it's supposed to rise. On a Monday afternoon in late September, Donald Trump gathered Iowa Republicans in the Oval Office and announced that Mesabi Metallics would invest $15bn to make the state home to the biggest steel mill in the United States. One month later, and just days before the midterm election, word has spread in Wever — population 142 — that the mill will be built somewhere nearby. That's been about it: no workers on a job site, no machinery on the dirt roads leading down toward the Mississippi River.

Ask about the project in town, and the reaction isn't enthusiasm. It's skepticism.

"More jobs," Missy Pollpeter, 52, said of the project's potential as she dined at the Green Bay Bar and Grill, Wever's only restaurant.

"If they bring it here," her husband, Mike Pollpeter, 60, said as he finished a burger.

What does the White House say the project delivers?

On paper, the numbers look significant for a corner of Iowa with a long history of manufacturing and the disinvestment that has struck much of the industrial midwest. According to the White House, the project would create:

• 6,000 jobs during construction
• 1,750 jobs when complete
• $95bn in economic activity

What residents can't get over is how the project debuted, and who announced it. Trump made the plan public just over a month before Tuesday's midterms, when Iowa will play a major role in determining whether Democrats regain control of Congress amid the president's downbeat approval ratings. Wever itself sits in a congressional district viewed as the most competitive in the state.

Why does Foxconn keep coming up?

Trump has a history of proclamations that don't quite pan out, and locals remember.

"Remember Foxconn?" asked Jeff Thompson as he served drinks at Green Bay "Bottoms Up," the town's only bar. Foxconn, the electronics manufacturing giant, was famously declared by Trump during his first term to be building a massive factory in neighboring Wisconsin. The project flopped.

A similar situation may be playing out elsewhere this year. Just days after debuting the Iowa steel mill plans, Trump said South Korea would invest $54bn in a long-discussed natural gas pipeline in Alaska. Officials in Seoul said they'd agreed to no such deal.

Iowa's Republican-controlled legislature was undeterred. It quickly approved $1.4bn in tax breaks to make the mill happen.

Charles Sutton, a spokesperson for Mesabi — a Minnesota-based firm that is part of the Indian conglomerate Essar Group — said the company is on track to produce steel by 2030 from a site in "eastern Iowa," the location of which will be announced "in the very near future."

"The project is in active development with strong momentum," Sutton said. "We anticipate being able to make several announcements in the coming weeks in line with the project schedule."

What do the politicians riding on it say?

Mariannette Miller-Meeks, the Republican who represents south-eastern Iowa, said "the project is for sure happening." Elected to a third term in 2024 by fewer than 800 votes, she's a top Democratic target this year as the party vies to regain control of the House.

Campaigning in Fort Madison, 10 minutes south of Wever, Miller-Meeks credited Trump's tariff regime and his major domestic policy bill with making the project possible. But she conceded the details are under negotiation between the county and Mesabi. "It will be on the outcome of those negotiations, but it will be coming to south-east Iowa," she said.

Blaine Watkins, a Republican state legislator who represents the area, said the mill would "completely change" Lee county, where Trump won almost two-thirds of the vote in 2024. Talks had been going on for seven or eight months, he said, and he had a hard time believing they wouldn't come to fruition.

"As far as I'm concerned, unless someone says we're not going to do it, they're doing it, and we're negotiating like they're going to do it," Watkins said.

Who stands to gain — and who's hedging?

A short drive north from Wever sits Burlington, once known as the "Backhoe Capital of the World" because the excavators were first produced there. Earlier this year, the multinational firm CNH closed the plant that made the machines, putting about 200 people out of work.

Burlington's mayor, Jon Billups, said many who lost jobs found other work at area manufacturers, and he welcomed a steel mill within commuting distance. "What happens that's good for the region is good for Burlington, and what happens in Burlington is normally good for the region," he said.

Democrats hoping to win statewide office in Iowa after years of losses like the idea too — if it happens.

"I hope so," Josh Turek, the Democratic state representative running for US Senate, replied when asked if he thought the facility would get built. Turek, who voted for the tax breaks in the legislature, said: "We need the jobs and we need American manufacturing to return here, and return here to Iowa because this is a state that is uniquely hurting and struggling."

Rob Sand, the Democratic nominee for governor, struck a harder bargain: "A good deal for Iowans that gets the steel plant done would be a priority. But I'm not going to give away the farm to get there."

Why are the unions holding back?

Local trade unions would normally champion a project this size. They have doubts about this one.

"I want it to be real, right? I think it'd be great for the area. I think it's great for the workers, but I'm skeptical," said Chris Tucker, international representative for the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, which has endorsed Turek and Sand. He, too, remembered Foxconn.

For Ryan Drew, president of the Des Moines-Henry County Labor Alliance, the optics of the Oval Office rollout — with Miller-Meeks and Ashley Hinson, the congresswoman facing Turek in the Senate race, standing beside Trump — gave him pause.

"You've got the three, either people up for election in the Congress or up for re-election … standing there in the Oval Office, somehow feeling they like they had a piece in this," Drew said. "It's just kind of the way it was unveiled in there that it kind of makes you wonder if it's legitimate or not."

Mike Strom, who owns both the bar and the restaurant in Wever, has tried to find out. He's pored through public records and talked to neighbors, and turned up nothing — no records of land sales, not even confidential ones that could signal deals in progress. People living in a floodplain where locals suspect the mill could be built haven't reported anyone coming by to ask about their land.

"I'm a huge proponent of, I'll believe it when I see it," Strom said. "Because you hear a lot of things."

With Mesabi promising steel production by 2030 and a site announcement in "the very near future," the weeks after Tuesday's election will show whether the $15bn plan survives contact with dirt.