People may complain that steel prices are “a little bit more expensive” but they will eventually fall and the duties will protect an industry that is essential to national security, Trump said.

The result, the president said, will be competition that is “internal, like it used to be in the old days when we actually had steel, and US Steel was our greatest company.”

Trump said he hopes the special counsel’s investigation will end and is considering whether to talk to Mueller. “We’re looking at it,” he said, though he asserted the inquiry has been “badly discredited.” Trump and his allies have frequently criticized the investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

Trump’s lawyers are still negotiating with Mueller’s team, hoping to limit the scope of the investigators’ questions. His lawyers last week rejected the latest offer from Mueller.

The president also defended his decision to revoke former CIA Director John Brennan’s security clearance and his public warning that he is considering doing the same to other former national security officials who have been critical of him, including former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and former FBI Director James Comey.

“I don’t trust many of those people on that list,” Trump said. “I think that they’re very duplicitous. I think they’re not good people.”

Brennan wrote on Twitter that the revocation of his security clearance was “part of a broader effort by Mr Trump to suppress freedom of speech & punish critics.”