Former Acting Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan, testifying at a Senate Homeland Security subcommittee hearing, said that in order to implement more withhold release orders, the Department of Homeland Security needs more resources to do investigations in the foreign countries where forced labor is alleged.
Florida's two Republican senators, Rick Scott and Marco Rubio, along with Rep. Al Lawson, D-Fla., and the top Republican on the House Trade subcommittee, Rep. Vern Buchanan, R-Fla., reintroduced a bill that would change antidumping law to allow fruit and vegetable growers to bring cases when the injury is for only part of the growing season, and would not require the majority of growers to initiate a case.
Seven senators, including Senate Foreign Relations Committee ranking member Jim Risch, R-Idaho, are asking the administration to consider removing Nicaragua from the free trade agreement with Central American countries if political conditions in that country continue to deteriorate. Risch was joined on the June 10 letter by Sens. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., Dick Durbin, D-Ill., Marco Rubio, R-Fla., John Cornyn, R-Texas, Todd Young, R-Ind. and Bill Cassidy, R-La.
Senate Finance Committee ranking member Mike Crapo and Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., announced June 14 that they sent a letter to the commerce secretary reminding her that by law, reports on the conclusions of Section 232 investigations are to be made public. The letter directs Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo to send copies of reports on autos and auto parts, uranium, electric transformers and cores, vanadium, and titatanium sponges to the Senate by June 25 and to publish reports, minus business confidential information, as soon as possible.
Florida's two U.S. senators are complaining that the Department of Agriculture decision to allow the importation of five varieties of citrus fruits from China is too risky. They said the pest risk assessment identified "15 pest species of mites, fruit flies, and moths and two pathogens, including those that cause citrus canker and citrus black spot diseases, which could ‘cause unacceptable impacts’ if they enter the U.S. via imports of these Chinese citrus products. Risking the introduction of invasive species and diseases into the U.S. is irresponsible, especially given our knowledge of how citrus greening previously entered our country by imported citrus and is spread by an invasive pest species, the Asian citrus psyllid.”
Rep. Kevin Brady of Texas, the top Republican on the House Ways and Means Committee, has expressed optimism that the House can pass a renewal of the Generalized System of Preferences benefits program and the Miscellaneous Tariff Bill that will match the amendment passed in the Senate as part of its China package. However, when asked by International Trade Today on June 11 if the House would include the anti-counterfeiting measures and the request to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative to re-open Section 301 exclusions, Brady said he didn't know. He said there's always been bipartisan support for fighting counterfeits, and with regard to the exclusions, "there’s a very strong interest for both chambers and both sides of the aisle," he said.
Rep. Devin Nunes of California, the top Republican on the House Ways and Means Subcommittee on Health, introduced a bill June 8 that would require a congressional vote before the U.S. could agree at the World Trade Organization to waive intellectual property rights on COVID-19 vaccines, a process known as a Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) Agreement waiver. The bill, H.R. 3788, “pushes back against the Biden Administration’s effort to surrender expensive American medical technology to foreign competitors,” Nunes said in a news release. “The Biden Administration’s support for surrendering intellectual property protections for American-made COVID-19 vaccines serves only to harm Americans and help hostile foreign powers like Communist China. Indeed, it’s hard to imagine a more self-defeating or unjust policy.”
Sens. Gary Peters, D-Mich., and Richard Burr, R-N.C., reintroduced a bill directing the administration to establish a task force to identify potential countervailable subsidies, dumping and circumvention with respect to trade, and to forward its findings to the Commerce Department's International Trade Administration so that antidumping or countervailing cases can be self-initiated, or anti-circumvention investigations can be opened. A similar bill was introduced in 2019 and 2018 (see 1903050025). The bill's text was published June 8.
Rep. Suzan DelBene, D-Wash., one of the House stalwarts for trade in the Democratic party, along with Rep. Rick Larsen, D-Wash., another trade moderate, and fellow Washington delegation member and Democrat Sen. Patty Murray, are asking that Canadian solar modules be exempted from the solar safeguard tariff and that a more generous tariff rate quota on solar cells be implemented.
Co-chairs of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore. and Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass. are asking Apple to engage with CBP to ensure that the company's supply chains are free of forced labor, and that they do not hire suppliers that accept "labor transfer" workers. According to press reports, Uyghur workers are being transplanted to other parts of China, in addition to their conscription at local factories and fields. CBP didn't comment.