A Republican Ways and Means Committee member said renewing the Generalized System of Preferences benefits program and the Miscellaneous Tariff Bill would require his committee and the Senate Finance Committee to come to an agreement on what they can support before the House moves a bill.
Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., introduced a bill that would stop electric vehicle tax credits for buyers until the Treasury Department issues guidance on battery and critical mineral content. The tax credits are currently available for North-America-assembled vehicles, no matter the content of their batteries, as Treasury said it needed more time to write guidance for those aspects of the law.
Undersecretary of State for Economic Growth, Energy, and the Environment Jose Fernandez told a think tank audience Jan. 24 that he had "very productive conversations" with business and government officials in South Korea and Japan on the Inflation Reduction Act.
The ranking Republican on the Senate Finance Committee said he was disappointed that renewing the Generalized System of Preferences benefits program and the Miscellaneous Tariff Bill didn't make it into year-end legislation in December. Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, said in a hallway interview at the Capitol that "for me, it's a very, very high priority. We really need to get it done."
U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai said she and U.K. Secretary of State for International Trade Kemi Badenoch talked about how to strengthen the U.S.-U.K. trade relationship, how to reform the World Trade Organization, and how to confront "the challenges posed by non-market economies."
Dozens of firms, large and small -- along with trade groups from agriculture and manufacturing -- asked the U.S. Trade Representative to retain or even increase Section 301 tariffs on their competitors' exports. The companies that said the Section 301 tariffs are providing leverage and leveling the playing field included a number of politically important and large steel industry players, such as Nucor, U.S. Steel and Cleveland-Cliffs. Opponents argued in the same docket that the tariffs had not met their aim, were driving inflation, or having unintended consequences on manufacturers (see 2301180029).
Hundreds of companies, as well as trade groups from agriculture, retailers and manufacturing, have told the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative that the Section 301 tariffs on $350 million in Chinese goods have not achieved their aim, have hurt U.S. businesses and, often, have not even moved production to other countries in Asia or to Mexico.
A study sponsored by five trade groups said that while tariffs of 7.5% to 25% on Chinese consumer goods imports have caused some trade diversion out of China, the primary result has been higher prices for customers.
Sens. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, and Bob Casey, D-Pa., are continuing to press Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo to convince the president to hike tariffs on transformer inputs such as grain-oriented electrical steel (GOES) laminations and cores. The two senators, who have a grain-oriented electrical steel producer in each of their states, published their letter on Jan. 13.
Senate Finance Committee member Bill Cassidy, R-La., wants the government to greatly expand its tariff liberalization, to cover many South American and Central American countries and to cover goods made in factories that moved from China to the Western Hemisphere.