House Small Business Committee Chairman Don Manzullo, R-Ill., has asked the U.S. Justice Department (www.usdoj.gov) to determine whether steel companies are illegally colluding in the wake of President Bush's imposition of steel tariffs on a number of product categories. Manzullo, quoting a U.S. Stel spokesman, alleged that domestic steelmakers have raised prices to "recover some of the pricing that's been lost." Steel prices have jumped 50 percent in some categories since Bush imposed up to 30 percent tariffs on some products in March. Manzullo, in a July 23 letter to Attorney General John Ashcroft, said he could understand some price increase, but "the magnitude of price increases reported seems excessive and suggests that U.S. steel producers may be engaging in unlawful, anti-competitive activity."
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