While grain-oriented electrical steel is subject to Section 232 tariffs, the domestic GOES producer says that electrical steel laminations and cores produced in Mexico and Canada continue to imperil the jobs at their mills. Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, and Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., represent the workers at those mills, and they, along with Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., have proposed an amendment to the bipartisan infrastructure bill that would instruct the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative to negotiate with Canada and Mexico in order to get them to agree to measures curtailing their exports if they are so numerous that they damage the business of Cleveland-Cliffs.
An annual survey of U.S. firms with operations in China that are members of the U.S.-China Business Council found that about 80% of firms said that U.S.-China tensions affected their businesses. Of that group, about half said it caused lost sales in China; about a quarter said they lost sales due to Chinese retaliatory tariffs.
The branch chief of the forced labor division at CBP gave importers advice on how to deal with a withhold release order, and what to ask to find out if there are forms of exploitation at your suppliers that qualify as forced labor. When your goods are detained at port, Edward Thurmond said during a webinar Aug. 4, remember you can export the goods instead of paying for their detention. "As of this moment, you can reexport those goods to Canada or Mexico. That option may go away in time. It can go out the next day. It can go out even the same day. You are not forced to wait for the admissibility period."
Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., told an Atlantic Council webinar that although business executives have told the bipartisan Climate Caucus that they want a carbon tax, it's more likely that a carbon adjustment tax would come first in Congress. Coons, speaking Aug. 3, said, “It seems that we may actually be able to move first, to assessing what the regulatory price already is on carbon in our economy and setting a border carbon adjustment” tax. He said it makes sense to work on that now because Canada, the United Kingdom and the European Union are all planning similar strategies.
A bill that would require every imported dog to have a health certificate from a licensed veterinarian, and would create an online database with import permits and documentation, was introduced Aug. 4 by Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Sen. Tina Smith, D-Minn. Within 18 months of the bill becoming law, the U.S. Department of Agriculture would be required to promulgate final regulations on that verification and on how dogs would be denied entry without the documentation.
The bipartisan infrastructure bill being debated in the Senate this week invests $17 billion in port infrastructure, according to a White House summary of the more than 2,000-page bill. That money would go to maintenance backlogs, emissions and congestion near ports, and for electrification and other low-carbon technologies at ports of entry. It also invests $25 billion in airports.
After the Commerce Department released the outstanding Section 232 reports (see 2107290039), the lawyers for a vanadium exporter cheered the outcome. The Trump administration initiated a national security investigation into vanadium imports, but the Biden administration made the decision that vanadium imports do not threaten national security.
The chair of the powerful House Appropriations Committee, with a bipartisan group of co-sponsors, is proposing that minks raised for fur production be added to the Lacey Act. That would prevent the sale, possession or transportation of captive American mink and their pelts. The text of MINKS are Superspreaders Act was published July 30. Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., was joined by 18 co-sponsors, including seven Republicans, led by Rep. Nancy Mace, R-S.C., and the ranking member of the Trade Subcommittee on Ways and Means. The change would take effect one year after enactment. “The factory farming of mink threatens public health, especially as we continue fighting against the COVID-19 pandemic,” DeLauro said in a press release when the bill was introduced. “The evidence is clear: mink operations can incubate and spread new COVID-19 variants and pose a unique threat of extending the pandemic. At the same time, with virtually no domestic market, the U.S. mink industry has been in steady decline for years. Now is the time for this legislation to become law, and I am urging all of my colleagues to support this bipartisan effort.”
Government representatives from the State Department, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative and Homeland Security and an official from the International Labor Organization reminded importers that there are tools to help them source responsibly, such as "Better Work," Responsible Sourcing and "Comply Chain." Josh Kagan, acting assistant U.S. trade representative for labor, told attendees "we want to be in partnership with the business community and recognizing that you are an important player in the global fight against forced labor." The speakers were convened at a U.S. Chamber of Commerce virtual event July 30 called "Tackling Forced Labor."
A permanent extension to the policy that protected customs brokers from having clawbacks as a result of their customers' bankruptcies was proposed by Rep. Andrew Garbarino, R-N.Y., on July 29. Currently, the duties that brokers transfer to CBP are not treated as vendor payments, so they are not subject to clawback provisions under the U.S. Bankruptcy Code, whereby payments to vendors within 90 days can be seized by the bankruptcy courts for redistribution. But that change expires at the end of the year (see 2012210045).