A week after workers at U.S. Steel's Granite City Works got a reprieve when the company reversed shutdown plans, an anti-steel dumping measure by Rep. Mike Bost, R-Murphysboro and other St. Louis-area legislators is getting steel-industry support in Congress.

The Trade Enforcement Effectiveness Act, whose co-sponsors include Reps. Rodney Davis, R-Taylorville, and John Shimkus, R-Collinsville, could be folded into a customs bill when it comes to the House of Representatives, although the timing of that is uncertain, said Jim Forbes, a spokesman for Bost.

The bill, introduced May 21, would streamline processes leading to anti-dumping eligibility and remedies for steel manufacturers who are hurt by imported steel. A briefing memo prepared for Bost says that domestic steel manufacturers currently have to show "significant or permanent harm" before they can petition for relief and then often have to wait for U.S. government remedies on the dumping of lower-cost foreign steel.

The legislation would give the Commerce Department more power to respond when foreign governments are uncooperative or when foreign prices or costs of steel have been distorted.

Bost's office said Tuesday that U.S. Steel, Nucor Corp., the Committee on Pipe and Tube Imports, the Steel Manufacturers Association, the American Iron and Steel Institute, and the Alliance for American Manufacturing have all said they support the measure.

The bill has 33 co-sponsors, from both parties.

The Pittsburgh-based U.S. Steel gave a 60-day warning in March that it planned to close the Granite City plant until steel demand revived, potentially costing 2,000 jobs. But last week the company said it would cut production but not close, and that 80 jobs were at risk.

Steel imports to the U.S. rose 38 percent in 2014 versus 2013.