Grassley Says He'd Still Like to See Section 232 Reform
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, acknowledged that the tightening of Brazilian quotas on semi-finished steel exports is intervening in the private sector (see 2008310010), and he said the committee will be watching what the outcome is. “I’m not an advocate for [using Section] 232, because I think in too many instances, [the assertion of] national security has been misused,” he said during a call with reporters Sept. 1. He said he still thinks Congress ought to limit the power of the president to restrict trade without congressional input. His former chief trade counsel said recently that she didn't think that could happen any time soon (see 2008250049).
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Grassley also said that U.S. trade negotiators ought to consider “sitting down and talking” with Taiwan, now that it has liberalized its pork import regulations in a way that's favorable to U.S. agriculture. “It could be parallel to what we do with China,” Grassley said, though he still applied a caveat that suggested that working on a phase two of the trade deal with China could take precedence. U.S. Trade Representative Robert “Lighthizer would know more about the sensitivities with China than I would, being how that might interact with talking to Taiwan.”