President-elect Donald Trump, in a social media posting Dec. 20, wrote: "I told the European Union that they must make up their tremendous deficit with the United States by the large scale purchase of our oil and gas. Otherwise, it is TARIFFS all the way!!!"
CBP processed more than 2.8 million entry summaries valued at more than $283 billion in November, with duties estimated at nearly $6.97 billion, the agency said Dec. 19 in a monthly update.
The Consumer Product Safety Commission has voted to require imported consumer products regulated by the CPSC to have their certificates of compliance filed electronically.
The Commerce Department set the 12-month 2024 value-added tariff preference level for certain apparel imported directly from Haiti eligible to receive duty-free treatment under the Haitian Hemispheric Opportunity Through Partnership Encouragement Act (HOPE). For the one-year period Dec. 20, 2024, through Dec. 19, 2025, the recalculated quantity of imports eligible for preferential treatment under the value-added TPL is 322,927,229 square meters equivalent (SME). Apparel articles entered in excess of this TPL will be subject to otherwise applicable duty rates.
The U.S. requested three more panels under the rapid response labor mechanism in the USMCA to investigate three Mexican manufacturing facilities. The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative said that the U.S. and Mexico "were not able to agree on a plan for the full resolution of workers’ concerns at their facilities," and so USTR activated the dispute settlement panel under USMCA.
The Court of International Trade on Dec. 19 declined to grant victory to G&H Diversified Manufacturing on the importer's claims that CBP previously, as part of its role in granting a Section 232 duty exclusion, already said the company's imports were subject to the exclusion. Judge Timothy Reif said open questions of fact still exist with regard to the extent of CBP's role in the exclusion process.
Shein, which has made its business selling fast fashion from Chinese manufacturers in de minimis packages to American consumers, announced Dec. 19 that it has begun participating in the Section 321 Data Pilot program. The Section 321 pilot is smaller and requires less data than Type 86 filing. The company said it had been participating more than 30 days, and CBP confirmed that it was receiving all the relevant import entry information for the data pilot.
Rep. Don Beyer, a long-time trade liberalization advocate, led a 90-minute hearing making the case against more tariffs in the second Trump administration, and Senate Budget Committee Chairman Sheldon Whitehouse, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden slammed the economic impact of campaign tariff promises as the Democrats try to use their bully pulpits in the last week before Republicans will have control at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue.
CBP issued the following releases on commercial trade and related matters:
A five-year renewal of the Haiti HELP/HOPE trade preferences is the only tariff liberalization legislation that was attached to the federal spending bill that will keep the federal government open through mid-March.