President Joe Biden decided to block the $14 billion takeover of US Steel by Japan’s Nippon Steel even though some top US officials did not believe there were sufficient national security grounds to kill the deal,

The companies accused President Joe Biden of blocking the deal for political reasons rather than true national security concerns.

U.S. Steel and Japan’s Nippon Steel sued the United States government on Monday in a last-ditch attempt to revive their attempted merger after President Biden blocked it last week on the basis that the transaction posed a threat to national security.

Nippon Steel, whose multibillion-dollar proposal to buy struggling US Steel was blocked by President Joe Biden last week, says it is considering taking legal action against the US government.

A first lawsuit was filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, “challenging violation of the Constitutional guarantee of due process and statutory procedural requirements,” the companies said in a joint statement.

The suit, filed Monday in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, alleges that it was a political decision and violated the companies' due process.

U.S. Steel and Nippon Steel said on Monday that it is suing over President Joe Biden's decision to block its sales agreement and a domestic competitor and union over their actions to scuttle the deal.

By blocking a Japanese company’s takeover of U.S. Steel, President Joe Biden says he is protecting good jobs in the American heartland

Joe Biden said the deal would create "risk for our national security and our critical supply chains." President-elect Trump also opposed the takeover.