A domestic steel manufacturer filed petitions on June 6 with the Commerce Department and the International Trade Commission requesting new antidumping duty investigations on collated steel staples from South Korea, China and Taiwan, and new countervailing duties on the same product from China. Commerce will now decide whether to begin AD/CVD investigations on collated steel staples that could eventually result in the assessment of AD/CV duties. The petition was filed by Kyocera Senco Industrial Tools, Inc.
Many of the specifics of the new 5 percent tariffs on goods from Mexico that are planned for a June 10 start remain in flux, a CBP official said during a June 6 conference call. When asked about whether there will be a Chapter 99 Harmonized Tariff Schedule code and if the tariffs would apply to everything coming from Mexico, the CBP official declined to answer. "At this point, we're just as much in the dark, with a lot of things that's going on," the official said. "We've been working on this for almost two weeks and things are constantly changing. Anything that I may tell you now may not be the process when it's fully operable. So I don't want to give you any misinformation, and I don't want to lead you to believe it's going to be something when it can change tonight. So therefore I would rather not give you any information because all of it is still up in the air and subjective because nothing has been signed." Assistant Commissioner Brenda Smith also provided an update to industry on June 6. Currently, the only official notices for the tariffs is a series of tweets from President Donald Trump (see 1905300066) and a White House statement.
The International Trade Commission recently issued Revision 6 to the Harmonized Tariff Schedule. Changes include the removal of Turkey from the Generalized System of Preferences program (see 1905170004), including its elimination from the list of GSP countries in General Note 4 and the removal of Turkish goods from the list of country-product pairs ineligible for GSP. The new version also removes Turkey from the lists in U.S. Notes 17 and 18 to Chapter 99 of developing countries exempt from safeguard duties on washing machines and solar cells. These changes took effect May 17. Effective May 20, the tariff schedule is amended to remove additional Section 232 tariffs on steel products from Turkey provided for in U.S. Note 16 to Chapter 99 and in subheading 9903.80.02, so that Turkey is now subject to the 25% tariff applicable to most other countries. Finally, Revision 6 includes changes to reflect the recently announced exemption of Mexico and Canada from Section 232 tariffs on steel and aluminum (see 1905170044), with modifications to U.S. Note 16 to Chapter 99 and subheadings 9903.80.01 and 9903.85.01 that took effect May 20.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative posted a notice on its website that extends the June 1 deadline to June 15 for goods in transit that will be subject to a Section 301 tariff increase (see 1905310070). Chinese imports subject to the third tranche of Section 301 tariffs that were on the water as of May 10 will stay at the 10 percent tariff rate through June 15. The previously announced HTS subheading, 9903.88.09, will continue to apply to those goods, USTR said.
The following lawsuits were filed at the Court of International Trade during the week of May 27 - June 2:
CBP created Harmonized System Update (HSU) 1910 on June 3, containing 1,379 Automated Broker Interface records and 283 Harmonized Tariff Schedule records, it said in a CSMS message. The update includes modifications related to USTR's extension of the Section 301 tariff increase from 10% to 25% to June 15 for ships that were already on the water as of May 10 (see 1905310070). It also includes changes related to the removal of India from eligibility for the Generalized System of Preferences program (see 1905310072). Modifications required by the verification of the 2019 HTS are included as well.
Tariffs on Mexican imports would have a profound impact on the U.S. TV business if the Trump administration were to make good on its threat to impose 25 percent duties by Oct. 1 (see 1905310044), suggests our analysis of International Trade Commission import data. ITC statistics show the monetary fallout from 25 percent duties on finished TVs imported from Mexico could possibly exceed that of the threatened 25 percent Section 301 List 4 tariffs on TVs from China, even though China ships many more TVs to the U.S. than Mexico does.
The Commerce Department and the International Trade Commission began five-year sunset reviews of the antidumping duty orders on carbon and certain alloy steel wire rod from Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico, Moldova, and Trinidad and Tobago (A-351-832, A-560-815, A-201-830, A-841-805, A-274-804); circular welded austenitic stainless pressure pipe from China (A-570-930), welded stainless steel pressure pipe from Malaysia, Vietnam and Thailand (A-557-815, A-552-816, A-549-830); oil country tubular goods from India, Turkey and South Korea (A-533-857, A-489-816, A-580-870); and silicon metal from Russia (A-821-817); as well as the countervailing duty orders on carbon and certain alloy steel wire rod from Brazil (C-351-833); oil country tubular goods from India and Turkey (C-533-858, C-489-817); and circular welded austenitic stainless pressure pipe from China (C-570-931); and the antidumping duty suspension agreement on oil country tubular goods from Ukraine (A-823-815).
The Commerce Department made preliminary affirmative antidumping duty determinations that imports of refillable stainless steel kegs from Germany (A-428-846), Mexico (A-201-849) and China (A-570-093) are being sold in the U.S. at less than fair value. The agency will impose AD duty cash requirements retroactively on some entries of subject merchandise from China and all entries from Mexico beginning March 6, 2019. For all German exporters and the remaining Chinese and Mexican exporters, suspension of liquidation and cash deposit requirements take effect June 4.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative is publishing its latest list of product exclusions from the first tranche of $34 billion in Section 301 tariffs on China (see 1905090067). This fifth list of exclusions includes one full tariff schedule subheading, as well as 88 subsets of tariff numbers in chapters 84, 85 and 90. The new exclusions take effect retroactively from July 6, 2018, when the $34 billion in tariffs originally entered into force, and will remain for one year following publication of USTR’s notice. USTR is creating Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading 9903.88.10 for the new set of exclusions.