The following lawsuits were filed at the Court of International Trade during the week of Jan. 19-25:
Despite renewed vigor to tackle Trade Promotion Authority in the 114th Congress, Senate lawmakers continue to negotiate whether to add a number of expired or expiring trade bills to an initial TPA package, senators and lobbyists said over recent days. Senate Finance Chairman Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, may still opt to introduce a standalone TPA bill, said those interviewed. Either way, many lawmakers, but primarily Democrats, are poised to muscle a number of amendments onto the bill at some point in the legislative process.
Presidential pressure on Congressional Democrats to support Trade Promotion Authority is critical to moving that legislation in the near future, said Senate Finance Chairman Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, in a speech to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce on Jan. 20 (here). Hatch spoke hours before President Barack Obama delivered his 2015 State of the Union. The speech focused predominantly on tax reform, another central policy area in the Finance Committee’s jurisdiction, and also touched on healthcare and pension overhaul.
The U.S. needs to lock down the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership in order to prevent China from shaping the rules for global trade, said President Barack Obama in his Jan. 20 State of the Union address. Congress needs to first deliver Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) to do that, said Obama.
The Obama administration again faulted Bangladesh for insufficient reforms to infrastructure and labor conditions in the country and rejected its bid to rejoin the group of Generalized System of Preferences beneficiaries. Still, Bangladesh is continuously making progress in improving those conditions, said an interagency review led by the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative. GSP expired in June 2013, but many lawmakers and industry representatives are jockeying to advance a renewal bill in the first months of this Congress (see 1501130001).
Democratic senators may be angling to tack antidumping and countervailing duty (CV/DVD) enforcement provisions on a Trade Promotion Authority bill that's expected to surface in the coming weeks, lawmakers and industry lobbyists said. Those provisions may not make the cut in an initial TPA package or through the amendment process though, nor are they guaranteed to attract more Democratic votes for the TPA measure, said those interviewed.
The new chairmen of the House Ways and Means and Senate Finance Committees should move quickly to address expired or expiring trade programs, said the American Apparel and Footwear Association in a Jan. 7 letter to the lawmakers. The committee chairmen, Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wisc., and Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, "have an historic opportunity to expand US trade," the association said. The AAFA encouraged "immediate enactment of legislation to renew expired and expiring trade programs, such as the Generalized System of Preferences, the African Growth and Opportunity Act, and the Nicaragua Tariff Preference Level. The AGOA program is set to expire later this year, while GSP and the Nicaragua programs are already expired.
Lawmakers may float a Trade Promotion Authority bill in the coming weeks that will mirror the TPA measure introduced a year ago, and the legislation will have the votes in both chambers to pass, said trade analysts and lawyers in recent interviews. There is likely to be small changes to the bill, which may attract a few more Democratic votes, most critically in the Senate, said the analysts and lawyers.
International Trade Today is providing readers with some of the top stories for 2014 in case they were missed.
The International Trade Commission posted the 2015 edition of the Harmonized Tariff Schedule (here). The new HTS implements changes made by several presidential proclamations to the eligibility for preferential trade programs of Russia, Madagascar, Swaziland, Guinea, Guinea-Bisseau, and South Sudan. It also adds new statistical suffixes to several tariff subheadings for products that include plastic gift wrapping materials, diamond sawblade parts, and extension cords. Most of the changes take effect Jan. 1.