President Donald Trump, in a signing ceremony Jan. 29, said he would be ending the devastation that NAFTA brought and said that its replacement will strengthen what he called the country's blue-collar boom, “delivering massive gains for the loyal citizens of our nation.” Democrats, who were not invited to the White House ceremony, during their own press conferences ahead of the signing, emphasized how much they'd changed what the president submitted to them, by strengthening labor enforcement and environmental provisions, and removing patent protections for certain kinds of prescription drugs.
While the phase one deal is a welcome pause in trade war hostilities between China and the U.S., the president of the Asia Society Policy Institute said a conclusion to phase two -- which presumably would lift Section 301 tariffs -- won't come this year. The think tank's president, Kevin Rudd, who also is a former prime minister of Australia, said at a program Jan. 28, “I think the best way to look at the phase one deal is that it's a ceasefire. I wouldn't go beyond that, to be honest.” He added, “I don't think it's in either side's political interest to see phase two conclude or fail on this side of a presidential election.”
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, as he talked about attending the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement signing ceremony, acknowledged that there are a number of steps before the NAFTA replacement can come into force. He said on a Jan. 28 phone call with reporters that he thinks Canada will ratify “probably within the next 30 days,” but then all parties will have to show how they “will be able to carry out their USMCA obligations so that this can enter into force.” Here at home, uniform regulations for the new rules of origin have to be promulgated before the U.S. can certify it's ready for USMCA. Still, Grassley said, Trump will be running his re-election campaign on replacing NAFTA. “I'm glad he can say that, and I'm willing to say it for him, too,” he said. “He likes to brag, and this is legitimately something to brag about.”
When the new 25 percent Section 232 tariffs go into effect on finished steel products, approximately $800 million in goods will be affected, according to International Trade Commission data for the last full year of imports. That does not include more than $100 million in imports from South Korea, Mexico and Canada that will be exempt from the new policy.
Importers and domestic producers are waiting to find out which steel and aluminum finished products will be hit with 25 percent and 10 percent tariffs, respectively (see 2001250003), because the administration said tariffs on the raw materials that make those products have not benefited domestic producers enough.
The government will impose an additional 25 percent tariffs on some steel articles and 10 percent on some aluminum products starting Feb. 8, President Donald Trump said in a proclamation released late on Jan. 24. The new tariffs are because there has been an import surge in some products made from steel and aluminum, and because domestic capacity has not risen as much as expected from the 232 tariff action, it said.
Despite resumed talk about tariffs on European autos, U.S. Chamber of Commerce officials say they are heartened by the first signs of progress in months for trade talks between the European Union and the United States. Marjorie Chorlins, the Chamber's senior vice president of European affairs, said with a new team at the European Commission, and the positive comments after the meeting in Davos, Switzerland, between President Donald Trump and EC President Ursula von der Leyen, the business community is feeling new hope for an improvement in relations. The officials spoke during a Jan. 24 conference call.
The Department of Homeland Security will take several new steps toward preventing the importation of counterfeit goods, executive branch officials said during a Jan.24 press conference to discuss a report on the subject. Peter Navarro, a close White House adviser on trade, said of the report: “What they produced is both historic and transcendent. The guts of this are the 10 sets of government actions that will be implemented immediately.” But, he said, 10 best practices for private industry -- which are voluntary -- are as important, if not more important. He said that currently, the burden is on the intellectual property rights holders to police the internet, and the government to catch counterfeits in shipments.
New European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told a German wire service that she and President Donald Trump want an agreement that resolves issues “in a few weeks.” But she didn't say how comprehensive such an agreement would be.
Even though steel and aluminum tariffs have been in place since March 2018, the number of exclusion requests continues to grow, according to an updated analysis from the free market-oriented Mercatus Center at George Mason University. The new portal opened June 13, and from that time to Aug. 27, companies filed an average of 4,427 requests a month. Between Aug. 28 and Dec. 6, the monthly average was 7,190. Members of Congress have repeatedly criticized what they see as arbitrary decisions, the fact that each exclusion is limited to the requestor, and the influence of domestic steel and aluminum producers on Commerce decisions (see 1910170066 and 1910300058).