The U.S. is asking Mexico to review whether an Industrias del Interior (INISA) garment factory near Aguascalientes is coercing workers by favoring workers who support the company's collective bargaining agreement and disciplining -- and dismissing -- workers if they support the union Sindicato de Industrias del Interior. The administration made the announcement June 12. It is the first complaint not in the auto sector.
Just after the administration asked the International Trade Commission to examine the emissions intensity of the steel and aluminum sectors, a bipartisan bill was introduced in the Senate to tell the Energy Department to conduct a comprehensive study of the emissions from the production of aluminum, cement, iron and steel, plastic, and products made from all those materials, fertilizer, glass, lithium-ion batteries, paper and pulp, solar panels and cells, wind turbines, crude oil, refined oil products, natural gas, hydrogen, refined critical minerals and uranium.
U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai asked the International Trade Commission to produce a report on the greenhouse gas emissions in the domestic steel and aluminum sectors, "which will help to inform discussions with the European Union regarding the Global Arrangement on Sustainable Steel and Aluminum."
Rep. Darin LaHood, R-Ill., and 20 other members of the House of Representatives, mostly from the Midwest, asked U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai to make the ethanol export market in Brazil a priority, because Brazil has both non-tariff barriers and tariffs on U.S. ethanol exports.
A joint letter from U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai and Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo to the Senate Finance Committee chairman defended their efforts to engage with Congress as they negotiate the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework.
The U.S. asked for formal dispute settlement consultations with Mexico over its policies on biotech products, but did not commit to moving forward with a panel request if the consultations are not fruitful within 75 days. That's the earliest a panel could be requested under USMCA.
The International Trade Commission recently released Revision 6 to the 2023 Harmonized Tariff Schedule, which added subheading 9903.88.68. The subheading extends exclusions for a variety of medical products from 7.5% and 25% Section 301 tariffs under subheadings 9903.88.01, 9903.88.02, 9903.88.03, and 9903.88.15 if entered between June 1 and October 1, 2023, as announced by the U.S. Trade Representative in May (see 2305120054).
Trade agreements could support the administration's goal of fighting deforestation, and so could legislation similar to the Forest Act (see 2110070050), but either path will have to contend with the difficulties of political sensitivities in targeted countries, the possibility of unintended consequences, and the logistical challenges of identifying products from deforested land and enforcing a ban on their entry to the U.S., two recent reports said.
House Ways and Means Trade Subcommittee Chairman Adrian Smith, R-Neb., Rep. Michelle Fischbach, R-Minn., and 62 other Republican members, including Ways and Means Chairman Jason Smith, R-Mo., asked U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai to open a formal dispute under USMCA over Mexico's treatment of biotech corn imports.
An automotive parts casting foundry, part of a Mexican industrial conglomerate known as Grupo Industrial Saltillo, is the subject of the latest rapid response labor complaint from the U.S., as the administration argues that the approximately 500 workers at the Draxton foundry in Irapuato, Guanajuato, were harassed and intimidated when they tried to organize a new union. The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative also says the workers had to vote on a contract in 2022 without seeing it, and they still don't have a copy of the contract.