The House Appropriations Committee released a summary of its plans for several agencies on Sept. 1, and said it intends to eliminate funding for the Bureau of International Labor Affairs. That bureau, commonly known as ILAB, prepares the annual report on products made with the worst forms of child labor and forced labor. It also has an app to help companies called "SourceRight."
The U.S. apparently failed to implement promised tariff reductions on European Union goods in time for a Sept. 1 deadline outlined in an EU-U.S. joint statement issued Aug. 21.
President Donald Trump claimed that India offered to "cut their Tariffs to nothing," as India's Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, stood firm against U.S. tariff pressure and promised deeper trade ties with Russia.
Surety company U.S. Specialty Insurance Company argued in an Aug. 29 complaint at the Court of International Trade that CBP failed to use transaction value to value importer Cheer Rise's garment entries. Instead, the agency arbitrarily decided to use the "fall back method" of appraisal, "rendering the appraisement unlawful," the complaint said (U.S. Specialty Insurance Co. v. United States, CIT # 25-00188).
DOJ launched a cross-agency "Trade Fraud Task Force" on Aug. 29 to "bring robust enforcement against importers and other parties who seek to defraud the United States," the agency announced. The task force will bring together attorneys from the agency's civil and criminal divisions, along with officials at CBP, to target tariff evasion and "smugglers who seek to import prohibited goods into the American economy."
CBP issued the following releases on commercial trade and related matters:
A listing of recent Commerce Department antidumping and countervailing duty messages posted on CBP's website Aug. 29, along with the case number(s) and CBP message number, is provided below. The messages are available by searching for the listed CBP message number at CBP's ADCVD Search page.
A GAO report suggests that DHS' efforts to combat fentanyl trafficking have been "limited," despite an as-yet-unfulfilled requirement in a law passed by Congress in 2023 for DHS to develop a program to collect data and establish measures and performance goals for its anti-fentanyl efforts.
CBP late last week provided guidance on the extension of Section 301 product exclusions for goods imported from China, noting that ACE functionality for the acceptance of these exclusions is available.
CBP began developing a system to automate duty and fee calculations for global mail entries in May, but the target deployment date for the functionality is still to be determined, according to the agency's ACE Development and Deployment Schedule for August.