WASHINGTON, Aug. 13, 2025 /PRNewswire/ — The National Association of Homebuilders (NAHB) has a long-standing policy priority of advocating for Canadian softwood lumber imports. This is despite a well-established record resulting from numerous and exhaustive investigations by the U.S. Department of Commerce that Canada is dumping its lumber into the U.S. market and enjoys harmful and distortive subsidies — which boosts the Canadian industry at the expense of U.S. industry and workers.
Components of the Price of a New Home, 2024 (PRNewsfoto/The U.S. Lumber Coalition)
NAHB maintains its constant drumbeat of support for the unrestrained importation of unfairly traded Canadian lumber despite an equally well-established record that these Canadian imports cause material harm to the U.S. lumber industry and its workers, as repeatedly confirmed through exhaustive investigations and findings by the U.S. International Trade Commission.
“NAHB’s unyielding support for the Canadian softwood lumber industry, which benefits from dozens of unfair subsidies and dumps its product at the direct expense of U.S. softwood lumber producers and workers raises questions regarding the organization’s motivation. Past NAHB statements would seem to endorse the market disrupting and price suppressing effects of unfair trade. Considering the long-term detrimental impact on U.S. softwood lumber production, and the resulting negative impacts on our country’s overall lumber supply, it seems like a very short-sighted policy priority,” stated Zoltan van Heyningen, Executive Director of the U.S. Lumber Coalition. He added, “in order to advocate for the Canadian softwood lumber industry and Canadian workers, NAHB seems willing to knowingly peddle unfounded scare tactics and claims as it fights against President Trump’s America First trade law enforcement priorities.”
“We often use NAHB’s own analysis to push back on some of the ridiculous claims that the organization makes in its advocacy for Canadian lumber companies and workers. For example, NAHB’s own ‘Priced Out’ analysis suggests that large increases in homebuilder profits during certain periods actually resulted in more than 4.7 million American households being priced out of the market for a median-priced new home,” stated van Heyningen. See study: High Homebuilder Profits Have Priced Millions Out of the U.S. Housing Market.
“Instead of pushing a flawed analysis that could, in fact, shed a bad light on its own members, NAHB should support the enforcement of U.S. trade laws against unfairly traded Canadian lumber imports as this enforcement has boosted U.S. lumber production by over 30 billion board feet after the addition of close to 9 billion board feet of U.S. production capacity since 2016,” added van Heyningen.
“The Canadian industry and Canadian talking heads advocating for the Canadian industry are more than happy to parrot NAHB’s misleading and false claims regarding the impact of trade law enforcement on housing affordability. It is nothing more than an unfounded scare tactic to attack President Trump’s America First focus on trade law enforcement. That self-interested approach does not change the fact that continued full enforcement of the U.S. trade laws will strengthen domestic supply lines by maximizing long-term domestic production and lumber availability produced by U.S. workers to build U.S. homes,” concluded van Heyningen.
More Information
U.S. lumber industry and workers sent a letter to President Trump on the need for continued strong enforcement of the U.S. trade laws to keep expanding U.S. lumber manufacturing and availability to build more American homes with American lumber. https://uslumbercoalition.org/story/u-s-lumber-industry-and-workers-letter-to-president-trump/
Enforcing U.S. trade laws helps increase the U.S. supply of lumber to build American homes, all without impacting the cost of a new home, as demonstrated by data from the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) and Fastmarkets Random Lengths.
About the U.S. Lumber CoalitionThe U.S. Lumber Coalition is an alliance of large and small softwood lumber producers from around the country, joined by their employees and woodland owners, working to address Canada’s unfair lumber trade practices. Our goal is to serve as the voice of the American lumber community and effectively address Canada’s unfair softwood lumber trade practices. The Coalition supports the full enforcement of the U.S. trade laws to allow the U.S. industry to invest and grow to its natural size without being impaired by unfairly traded imports. Continued full enforcement of the U.S. trade laws will strengthen domestic supply lines by maximizing long-term domestic production and lumber availability produced by U.S. workers to build U.S. homes. For more information, please visit the Coalition’s website at www.uslumbercoalition.org.
CONTACT: Zoltan van Heyningen
[email protected] | 202-805-9133
SOURCE U.S. Lumber Coalition
