CBP issued the following releases on commercial trade and related matters:
International Trade Today is providing readers with the top stories from last week in case they were missed. All articles can be found by searching on the titles or by clicking on the hyperlinked reference number.
PHILADELPHIA -- CBP has not issued any withhold release orders for goods unrelated to Uyghur forced labor since the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act passed in late 2021. Eric Choy, the CBP official whose office oversees the ban on goods made with forced labor, said that targeting forced labor abuses outside of China "is something that we're definitely reprioritizing resources [for], to focus in on those efforts." Choy, who is executive director of Trade Remedy Law Enforcement Directorate, said in an interview during the CBP Trade Facilitation and Cargo Security Summit last week that he expects there will be a WRO announced before October.
CBP plans to deploy a new capability that will “migrate all ACE Portal Periodic Monthly Statement (PMS) features to the modernized ACE Portal” on April 13, it said in an update to its ACE development and deployment calendar. That will include “the ability to designate participants, activate participants, and schedule upcoming statements.” Users will “no longer have access to PMS tools in the legacy ACE portal” at that time, CBP said.
The Commerce Department last week issued new antidumping and countervailing duty regulations, which, most notably, lifted the prohibition on the consideration of transnational subsidies in CVD cases (see 2403210070).
International Trade Today is providing readers with the top stories from last week in case they were missed. All articles can be found by searching on the titles or by clicking on the hyperlinked reference number.
PHILADELPHIA -- Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said that the "de minimis exception" impacts CBP's work to stop illegal drugs and other contraband from entering the United States.
PHILADELPHIA -- When CBP ran an audit to estimate how many packages that enter under de minimis violate Customs laws, it found about 9% did, either through misclassification, insufficient documentation, or more serious violations, like smuggling narcotics.
PHILADELPHIA -- Troy Miller, acting CBP commissioner, said that since stakeholders have said they're concerned that de minimis and trade cheating in USMCA and the Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement is damaging the domestic and Latin American textile and apparel industries, the department will release a comprehensive plan to intensify enforcement soon.
PHILADELPHIA -- Bill Reinsch, a senior scholar at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told CBP Executive Assistant Commissioner AnnMarie Highsmith that he is pessimistic Congress will vote on any trade bill, whether liberalizing trade, as in the Generalized System of Preferences benefits program or the Miscellaneous Tariff Bill, or restricting it, as in changes to de minimis eligibility or changes to trade remedy laws.